First inclusive triple-differential measurement of the muon-antineutrino charged-current cross section using the NOvA Near Detector

TL;DR

This paper reports the first triple-differential measurement of muon-antineutrino charged-current cross sections using the NOvA Near Detector, providing detailed insights into neutrino interactions across various phase-space regions.

Contribution

It introduces the first measurement of the triple-differential cross section for muon-antineutrino interactions, utilizing a large dataset and enabling detailed phase-space analysis.

Findings

Largest muon antineutrino interaction sample published

Discrepancies observed between measurements and event generator predictions

Measurement enables detailed study of different neutrino reaction processes

Abstract

We present the first measurement of the triple-differential muon antineutrino charged-current inclusive cross section, using the NOvA Near Detector and $12.5 \times 10^{20}$ protons on target in the NuMI beam. This sample of muon antineutrino interactions is the largest ever published, with approximately 1 million selected muon antineutrino events. The triple-differential cross section is measured in the final-state kinetic energy, the scattering angle, and the available energy of the interaction. The measurement enables phase-space regions populated by differing neutrino reaction processes to be isolated and the transition regions between them to be defined. The results are compared with the predictions of the main event generators used in the neutrino community and we observe energy- and angle-dependent discrepancies across a broad range of energies and interaction types