Benchmarking neutrino-nucleus quasielastic scattering model predictions against a missing energy profile obtained using a monoenergetic neutrino beam

TL;DR

This study benchmarks three nuclear ground state models in the NEUT neutrino generator against recent measurements of missing energy from monoenergetic neutrino interactions, providing insights into nuclear modeling accuracy.

Contribution

It compares the performance of spectral function and relativistic mean field models against experimental data, highlighting the importance of cascade and deexcitation processes.

Findings

Spectral function models outperform relativistic mean field models in missing energy distribution.

Including missing energy thresholds makes all models statistically acceptable.

Cascade and nuclear deexcitation simulations improve model agreement with data.

Abstract

We examine three exclusive nuclear ground state shell models implemented in the NEUT neutrino event generator and benchmark them against the recent JSNS$^2$ measurement of missing energy using a monoenergetic neutrino source. The nature of the measurement allows a detailed investigation of nuclear ground-state modeling using a neutrino source, and gives access to a direct measurement of the neutron spectral function in a $^{12}$C nucleus. The NEUT intranuclear cascade and nuclear deexcitation \textsc{NucDeEx} are used to simulate inelastic final-state interactions and nuclear deexcitations respectively. We find that the spectral function (SF) models perform better than relativistic mean field models in modeling both the ground state and the tail of the missing energy distribution when the NEUT cascade and nuclear excitation channels are turned on. We also find that taking into account the missing energy threshold for single nucleon knockout interactions results in all nuclear models being accepted based on the obtained $p$-values.