Dynamical Model of Coherent Pion Production in Neutrino-Nucleus Scattering

TL;DR

This paper develops a unified dynamical model combining electroweak pion production and pion-nucleus reactions to accurately predict coherent pion production in neutrino-nucleus scattering, relevant for neutrino oscillation experiments.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive model that describes pion-nucleus scattering and electroweak coherent pion production simultaneously, validated against experimental data.

Findings

Model accurately fits pi-12C scattering data

Predictions align with existing photo-production data

Results are consistent with recent neutrino scattering experiments

Abstract

We study coherent pion production in neutrino-nucleus scattering in the energy region relevant to neutrino oscillation experiments of current interest. Our approach is based on a combined use of the Sato-Lee model of electroweak pion production on a nucleon and the Delta-hole model of pion-nucleus reactions. Thus we develop a model which describes pion-nucleus scattering and electroweak coherent pion production in a unified manner. Numerical calculations are carried out for the case of the 12C target. All the free parameters in our model are fixed by fitting to both total and elastic differential cross sections for pi-12C scattering. Then we demonstrate the reliability of our approach by confronting our prediction for the coherent pion photo-productions with data. Finally, we calculate total and differential cross sections for neutrino-induced coherent pion production, and some of the results are (will be) compared with the recent (forthcoming) data from K2K, SciBooNE and MiniBooNE. We also study effect of the non-locality of the Delta-propagation in the nucleus, and compare the elementary amplitudes used in different microscopic calculations.