Status of the MicroBooNE Low Energy Excess Search

TL;DR

MicroBooNE is actively searching for low-energy electromagnetic excess events in neutrino interactions, aiming to clarify anomalies observed by MiniBooNE, with recent calibration and validation results reported as of mid-2020.

Contribution

This paper reports the current status and progress of MicroBooNE's low-energy excess search, including calibration, separation techniques, and validation efforts.

Findings

Calibration with $c0^0$ events completed

E/b separation techniques demonstrated

Analysis validation through sidebands in progress

Abstract

MicroBooNE is a neutrino experiment that utilizes a liquid argon time projection chamber (LArTPC) located on-axis in the Booster Neutrino Beam (BNB) at Fermilab. One of the experiment's main goals is to search for excess low-energy electromagnetic-like events as seen by the MiniBooNE experiment, located just downstream of MicroBooNE in the BNB. As MicroBooNE nears the completion of its first single-electron-like and single-photon-like searches, these proceedings present the status of MicroBooNE's low-energy excess search as of early summer 2020. In addition to presenting an overview of the approach to the analysis, we showcase results from $\pi^0$ calibrations and e/$\gamma$ separation, and sample results from sidebands aimed at validating the analysis' progress outside the low-energy signal region.