Limits on Active to Sterile Neutrino Oscillations from Disappearance Searches in the MINOS, Daya Bay, and Bugey-3 Experiments

TL;DR

This paper combines results from MINOS, Daya Bay, and Bugey-3 experiments to set stringent limits on sterile neutrino oscillations, excluding certain parameter regions and constraining the sterile neutrino phase space.

Contribution

It provides the first combined analysis of multiple experiments to tightly constrain sterile neutrino oscillation parameters in a four-neutrino framework.

Findings

Stringent limits on $ ext{sin}^2 2 heta_{ ext{mu e}}$ over a wide $ ext{Δ}m^2_{41}$ range.

Excludes sterile-neutrino mixing phase space suggested by LSND and MiniBooNE for $ ext{Δ}m^2_{41} < 0.8$ eV$^2$.

Probes complementary regions of parameter space, improving constraints on sterile neutrino models.

Abstract

Searches for a light sterile neutrino have been performed independently by the MINOS and the Daya Bay experiments using the muon (anti)neutrino and electron antineutrino disappearance channels, respectively. In this Letter, results from both experiments are combined with those from the Bugey-3 reactor neutrino experiment to constrain oscillations into light sterile neutrinos. The three experiments are sensitive to complementary regions of parameter space, enabling the combined analysis to probe regions allowed by the LSND and MiniBooNE experiments in a minimally extended four-neutrino flavor framework. Stringent limits on $\sin^2 2\theta_{\mu e}$ are set over 6 orders of magnitude in the sterile mass-squared splitting $\Delta m^2_{41}$. The sterile-neutrino mixing phase space allowed by the LSND and MiniBooNE experiments is excluded for $\Delta m^2_{41} < 0.8$ eV$^2$ at 95% CL$_s$.