First double-differential measurement of kinematic imbalance in neutrino interactions with the MicroBooNE detector

TL;DR

This paper presents the first flux-integrated double-differential measurement of quasielastic-like neutrino-argon cross sections, providing detailed insights into nuclear effects and aiding the refinement of neutrino interaction models.

Contribution

It introduces the first double-differential measurement of neutrino-argon cross sections sensitive to nuclear effects, improving understanding of neutrino-nucleus interactions.

Findings

Cross sections vary with phase-space regions, indicating different nuclear effects.

Data helps isolate specific nuclear effects in neutrino interactions.

Results support improved modeling for neutrino oscillation experiments.

Abstract

We report the first measurement of flux-integrated double-differential quasielastic-like neutrino-argon cross sections, which have been made using the Booster Neutrino Beam and the MicroBooNE detector at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. The data are presented as a function of kinematic imbalance variables which are sensitive to nuclear ground state distributions and hadronic reinteraction processes. We find that the measured cross sections in different phase-space regions are sensitive to different nuclear effects. Therefore, they enable the impact of specific nuclear effects on the neutrino-nucleus interaction to be isolated more completely than was possible using previous single-differential cross section measurements. Our results provide precision data to help test and improve neutrino-nucleus interaction models. They further support ongoing neutrino-oscillation studies by establishing phase-space regions where precise reaction modeling has already been achieved.