First Measurement of Neutrino Interactions in MicroBooNE

TL;DR

This paper reports the first measurements of neutrino interactions in the MicroBooNE detector, analyzing initial data to evaluate detector capabilities and to lay groundwork for future cross-section measurements.

Contribution

It provides the first neutrino interaction data from MicroBooNE and demonstrates automated event reconstruction in a large liquid argon TPC.

Findings

Initial neutrino interaction distributions obtained

Assessment of detector performance and operational challenges

Foundation for future cross-section measurements

Abstract

The MicroBooNE detector has recently completed its first year of neutrino beam data-taking in the Booster Neutrino Beam at Fermilab, having collected approximately half of its intended data ($3.4\times10^{20}$ of $6.6\times10^{20}$ protons on target). We present kinematic distributions of neutrino interactions observed from a small subset of this data (equivalent to $5\times10^{19}$ protons on target), both as a first step towards a charged-current muon neutrino cross-section on argon, and as an exploration of the capabilities and operational challenges of large liquid argon time projection chambers as neutrino detectors. These distributions have been assessed using fully automated event selection and reconstruction.