Current status of the LBNE neutrino beam

TL;DR

The paper reviews the design and current status of the LBNE neutrino beamline at Fermilab, highlighting its production process, design parameters, and upgrades for higher power operation.

Contribution

It provides a detailed overview of the LBNE neutrino beamline's design, modifications, and readiness for high-power neutrino production, based on physics goals and modeling.

Findings

Beam power initially ~700 kW, upgradeable to 2.3 MW.

Significant design changes made through Value Engineering.

Facility parameters aligned with physics objectives.

Abstract

The Long Baseline Neutrino Experiment (LBNE) will utilize a neutrino beamline facility located at Fermilab. The facility is designed to aim a beam of neutrinos toward a detector placed in South Dakota. The neutrinos are produced in a three-step process. First, protons from the Main Injector hit a solid target and produce mesons. Then, the charged mesons are focused by a set of focusing horns into the decay pipe, towards the far detector. Finally, the mesons that enter the decay pipe decay into neutrinos. The parameters of the facility were determined by an amalgam of the physics goals, the Monte Carlo modeling of the facility, and the experience gained by operating the NuMI facility at Fermilab. The initial beam power is expected to be ~700 kW, however some of the parameters were chosen to be able to deal with a beam power of 2.3 MW. The LBNE Neutrino Beam has made significant changes to the initial design through consideration of numerous Value Engineering proposals and the current design is described.