Probing Sterile Neutrino Parameters with Double Chooz, Daya Bay and RENO

TL;DR

This paper evaluates the ability of current reactor experiments Double Chooz, Daya Bay, and RENO to constrain sterile neutrino parameters, providing realistic exclusion regions and highlighting their significance in the low b4m^2_{41} range.

Contribution

It offers a detailed, realistic analysis of sterile neutrino sensitivity for these experiments, incorporating systematic errors and detector resolutions, and compares results with existing bounds.

Findings

Significant bounds on b4eb4 in the low b4m^2_{41} range

Experimental sensitivities complement existing bounds

Results help address tensions in sterile neutrino parameter space

Abstract

In this work, we present a realistic analysis of the potential of the present-day reactor experiments Double Chooz, Daya Bay and RENO for probing the existence of sterile neutrinos. We present exclusion regions for sterile oscillation parameters for each of these experiments, using simulations with realistic estimates of systematic errors and detector resolutions, and compare the sterile parameter sensitivity regions we obtain with the existing bounds from other reactor experiments. We find that these experimental set-ups give significant bounds on the parameter \Theta_{ee} especially in the low sterile oscillation region 0.01 < \Delta m_{41}^2 < 0.05 eV^2. These bounds can add to our understanding of the sterile neutrino sector since there is still a tension in the allowed regions from different experiments for sterile parameters.