Status of MIND

The Magnetised Iron Neutrino Detector (MIND) has been identied as the ideal candidate for the de-tection of the golden \wrong sign muon " channel at a Neutrino Factory. However, previous analyses of the channel relied on a parameterisation of the detector performance which assumed pefect muon pattern recog-nition. For the rst time, a study of the muon reconstruction eciency involvoing full pattern recognition has been carried out. Using a simple pattern recognition algorithm it is shown that past results assuming perfect muon identication can already be reproduced after one simple cut

Search for eV (pseudo)scalar penetrating particles in the SPS neutrino beam

We carried out a model-independent search for light scalar or pseudoscalar particles a's (an example of which is the axion) that couple to two photons by using a photon-regeneration method at high energies allowing a substantial increase in the sensitivity to eV masses.\ The experimental set-up is based on elements of the CERN West Area Neutrino Facility (WANF) beam line and theNOMAD neutrino detector.\ The new particles, if they exist, could be produced through the Primakoff effect in interactions of high energy photons, generated by the 450 GeV protons in the CERN SPS neutrino target, with virtual photons from the WANF horn magnetic field.\ The particles would penetrate the downstream shieldingand would be observed in the NOMAD neutrino detector through their re-conversion into real high energy photons byinteracting with the virtual photons from the magnetic field of the NOMAD dipole magnet.\ From the analysis of the data collected during the 1996 run with 1.08×1019 protons on target, 312 candidate events with energy between 5 and 140 GeV were found.\ This number is in general agreement with the expectation of 272±18 background events from standard neutrino processes.\ A 90 % CL upper limit on the aγγ-coupling gaγγ< 1.5×10−4 GeV−1 for a masses up to 40 eV is obtained

A precision measurement of charm dimuon production in neutrino interactions from the NOMAD experiment

We present our new measurement of the cross-section for charm dimuon production in neutrino iron interactions based upon the full statistics collected by the NOMAD experiment. After background subtraction we observe 15 344 charm dimuon events, providing the largest sample currently available. The analysis exploits the large inclusive charged current sample - about 9 x 10(6) events after all analysis cuts - and the high resolution NOMAD detector to constrain the total systematic uncertainty on the ratio of charm dimuon to inclusive Charged Current (CC) cross-sections to similar to 2%. We also perform a fit to the NOMAD data to extract the charm production parameters and the strange quark sea content of the nucleon within the NLO QCD approximation. We obtain a value of m(c)(m(c)) = 1.159 +/- 0.075 GeV/c(2) for the running mass of the charm quark in the (MS) over bar scheme and a strange quark sea suppression factor of kappa(s) = 0.591 +/- 0.019 at Q(2) = 20 GeV2/c(2).We extend our grateful appreciations to the CERN SPS staff for the magnificent performance of the neutrino beam. The experiment was supported by the following agencies: ARC and DIISR of Australia, IN2P3 and CEA of France, BMBF of Germany, INFN of Italy, JINR and INR of Russia, FNSRS of Switzerland, DOE, NSF, Sloan, and Cottrell Foundations of USA, and VP Research Office of the University of South Carolina. This work was partially supported by the University of South Carolina, by the DOE grant DE-FG02-95ER40910, by the Russian Federal grant 02.740.11.5220 and MK-432.2013.2, and JINR grant 13-201-01.Peer reviewe

Performance of long modules of silicon microstrip detectors

This note describes the performance of modules assembled with up to 12 silicon microstrip detectors. These modules were built for the instrumented Silicon Target (STAR) that has been installed in the NOMAD spectrometer, Laboratory and test beam results are compared with model predictions. For a module of nine detectors, test beam results indicate a signal-to-noise ratio of 19, a hit finding efficiency of 99.8% and a spatial resolution of 6.0 mu m. Laboratory measurements indicate that modules of twelve detectors exhibit a signal-to-noise ratio of the order of 16

Upper bound on neutrino mass based on T2K neutrino timing measurements

The Tokai to Kamioka (T2K) long-baseline neutrino experiment consists of a muon neutrino beam, produced at the J-PARC accelerator, a near detector complex and a large 295-km-distant far detector. The present work utilizes the T2K event timing measurements at the near and far detectors to study neutrino time of flight as a function of derived neutrino energy. Under the assumption of a relativistic relation between energy and time of flight, constraints on the neutrino rest mass can be derived. The sub-GeV neutrino beam in conjunction with timing precision of order tens of ns provide sensitivity to neutrino mass in the few MeV/c(2) range. We study the distribution of relative arrival times of muon and electron neutrino candidate events at the T2K far detector as a function of neutrino energy. The 90% C.L. upper limit on the mixture of neutrino mass eigenstates represented in the data sample is found to be m(v)(2) < 5.6 MeV2/c(4).We thank the J-PARC staff for superb accelerator performance and the CERN NA61 collaboration for providing valuable particle production data. We acknowledge the support of MEXT, Japan; NSERC, NRC and CFI, Canada; CEA and CNRS/IN2P3, France; DFG, Germany; INFN, Italy; National Science Centre (NCN), Poland; RSF, RFBR and MES, Russia; MINECO and ERDF funds, Spain; SNSF and SER, Switzerland; STFC, UK; and DOE, USA. We also thank CERN for the UA1/NOMAD magnet, DESY for the HERA-B magnet mover system, NII for SINET4, the WestGrid and SciNet consortia in Compute Canada, GridPP, UK. In addition participation of individual researchers and institutions has been further supported by funds from: ERC (FP7), EU; JSPS, Japan; Royal Society, UK; DOE Early Career program, USA.Peer reviewe

European Strategy for Accelerator-Based Neutrino Physics

Massive neutrinos reveal physics beyond the Standard Model, which could have deep consequences for our understanding of the Universe. Their study should therefore receive the highest level of priority in the European Strategy. The discovery and study of leptonic CP violation and precision studies of the transitions between neutrino flavours require high intensity, high precision, long baseline accelerator neutrino experiments. The community of European neutrino physicists involved in oscillation experiments is strong enough to support a major neutrino long baseline project in Europe, and has an ambitious, competitive and coherent vision to propose. Following the 2006 European Strategy for Particle Physics (ESPP) recommendations, two complementary design studies have been carried out: LAGUNA/LBNO, focused on deep underground detector sites, and EUROnu, focused on high intensity neutrino facilities. LAGUNA LBNO recommends, as first step, a conventional neutrino beam CN2PY from a CERN SPS North Area Neutrino Facility (NANF) aimed at the Pyhasalmi mine in Finland. A sterile neutrino search experiment which could also be situated in the CERN north area has been proposed (ICARUS-NESSIE) using a two detector set-up, allowing a definitive answer to the 20 year old question open by the LSND experiment. EUROnu concluded that a 10 GeV Neutrino Factory, aimed at a magnetized neutrino detector situated, also, at a baseline of around 2200 km (+-30%), would constitute the ultimate neutrino facility; it recommends that the next 5 years be devoted to the R&D, preparatory experiments and implementation study, in view of a proposal before the next ESPP update. The coherence and quality of this program calls for the continuation of neutrino beams at CERN after the CNGS, and for a high priority support from CERN and the member states to the experiments and R&D program.Comment: Prepared by the program committee of the Neutrino `town meeting', CERN, 14-16 May 2012 and submitted to the European Strategy For European Particle Physic

Briefing Book for the Zeuthen Workshop

On Jun 18th 2004, the CERN Council, upon the initiative of its President, Prof. Enzo Iarocci, established an ad hoc scientific advisory group (the Strategy Group), to produce a draft strategy for European particle physics, which is to be considered by a special meeting of the CERN Council, to be held in Lisbon on Jul 14th 2006. There are three volumes to the Briefing Book. This first volume contains an introductory essay on particle physics, a summary of the issues discussed at the Open Symposium, and discussions of the other themes that the Strategy should address. The introductory essay on particle physics and the other themes were commissioned by the Preparatory Group. The summary of the issues discussed in the Symposium was prepared by the chairs of the sessions, the session speakers and the scientific secretaries. We acknowledge that this has been a difficult task, again on a very tight timescale, and we would like to thank all of those who have contributed to this volume

Status report of the HARP experiment

The current status of the HARP experiment is shortly described, emphasizing the developments since the previous status report, which was presented in September 2007. The last section of this report is devoted to the comparisons of our large angle results with previously published data and some recent results of an alternative analysis performed by the so-called CDP group