Customers' perspectives on the impact of the Pathways to Work Condition Management Programme on their health, wellbeing and vocational activity

Aims: Pathways to Work is a UK initiative aimed at supporting customers on incapacity benefits to return to work. This qualitative study complements previous evaluations of Pathways to Work by exploring customers’ perceptions of the impact of the Condition Management Programme (CMP) offered to claimants with long-term health conditions. Methods: 39 customers took part in focus groups held at the seven sites where Pathways was originally piloted. The main focus of the discussions was on perceptions of the ways in which participation had impacted on health, well-being and return to work. The discussions were audio-recorded and fully transcribed for analysis using a text analysis framework to enable the development and refinement of categories and overarching patterns in the data. Results: Perceived impacts on health and wellbeing included a more positive outlook, social contact, changed perceptions of conditions and improvements in health. Some customers also reported an increase in their vocational activity and others felt ready to embark on new activities. Factors associated with positive outcomes included the extent and quality of contact with CMP staff and practical advice about condition management. Factors impeding positive employment outcomes related mainly to obstacles to returning to work. Conclusions: The results indicated that CMP can assist customers to learn about and manage their health conditions and increase their vocational activity, and that CMP therefore provides a promising means of enabling people with long-term health conditions to regain a fulfilling, productive life

Measurement of the underground atmospheric muon charge ratio using the MINOS Near Detector

The magnetized MINOS Near Detector, at a depth of 225 mwe, is used to measure the atmospheric muon charge ratio. The ratio of observed positive to negative atmospheric muon rates, using 301 days of data, is measured to be 1.266±0.001(stat)_(-0.014)^(+0.015)(syst). This measurement is consistent with previous results from other shallow underground detectors and is 0.108±0.019(stat+syst) lower than the measurement at the functionally identical MINOS Far Detector at a depth of 2070 mwe. This increase in charge ratio as a function of depth is consistent with an increase in the fraction of muons arising from kaon decay for increasing muon surface energie

Active to Sterile Neutrino Mixing Limits from Neutral-Current Interactions in MINOS

Results are reported from a search for active to sterile neutrino oscillations in the MINOS long-baseline experiment, based on the observation of neutral-current neutrino interactions, from an exposure to the NuMI neutrino beam of 7.07×10^(20) protons on target. A total of 802 neutral-current event candidates is observed in the Far Detector, compared to an expected number of 754±28(stat)±37(syst) for oscillations among three active flavors. The fraction f_s of disappearing ν_μ that may transition to ν_s is found to be less than 22% at the 90% C.L

New constraints on muon-neutrino to electron-neutrino transitions in MINOS

This paper reports results from a search for ν_μ → ν_e transitions by the MINOS experiment based on a 7×10^(20) protons-on-target exposure. Our observation of 54 candidate ν_e events in the far detector with a background of 49.1±7.0(stat)±2.7(syst) events predicted by the measurements in the near detector requires 2sin^2(2θ_(13))sin^2θ_(23)<0.12(0.20) at the 90% C.L. for the normal (inverted) mass hierarchy at δ_(CP)=0. The experiment sets the tightest limits to date on the value of θ_(13) for nearly all values of δ_(CP) for the normal neutrino mass hierarchy and maximal sin^2(2θ_(23))

Neutrino and Antineutrino Inclusive Charged-current Cross Section Measurements with the MINOS Near Detector

The energy dependence of the neutrino-iron and antineutrino-iron inclusive charged-current cross sections and their ratio have been measured using a high-statistics sample with the MINOS Near Detector exposed to the NuMI beam from the Main Injector at Fermilab. Neutrino and antineutrino fluxes were determined using a low hadronic energy subsample of charged-current events. We report measurements of neutrino-Fe (antineutrinoFe) cross section in the energy range 3-50 GeV (5-50 GeV) with precision of 2-8% (3-9%) and their ratio which is measured with precision 2-8%. The data set spans the region from low energy, where accurate measurements are sparse, up to the high-energy scaling region where the cross section is well understood.Comment: accepted by PR

Search for sterile neutrino mixing in the MINOS long-baseline experiment

A search for depletion of the combined flux of active neutrino species over a 735 km baseline is reported using neutral-current interaction data recorded by the MINOS detectors in the NuMI neutrino beam. Such a depletion is not expected according to conventional interpretations of neutrino oscillation data involving the three known neutrino flavors. A depletion would be a signature of oscillations or decay to postulated noninteracting sterile neutrinos, scenarios not ruled out by existing data. From an exposure of 3.18×10^(20) protons on target in which neutrinos of energies between ∼500  MeV and 120 GeV are produced predominantly as ν_μ, the visible energy spectrum of candidate neutral-current reactions in the MINOS far detector is reconstructed. Comparison of this spectrum to that inferred from a similarly selected near-detector sample shows that of the portion of the ν_μ flux observed to disappear in charged-current interaction data, the fraction that could be converting to a sterile state is less than 52% at 90% confidence level (C.L.). The hypothesis that active neutrinos mix with a single sterile neutrino via oscillations is tested by fitting the data to various models. In the particular four-neutrino models considered, the mixing angles θ_(24) and θ_(34) are constrained to be less than 11° and 56° at 90% C.L., respectively. The possibility that active neutrinos may decay to sterile neutrinos is also investigated. Pure neutrino decay without oscillations is ruled out at 5.4 standard deviations. For the scenario in which active neutrinos decay into sterile states concurrently with neutrino oscillations, a lower limit is established for the neutrino decay lifetime τ_3/m_3>2.1×10^(-12) s/eV at 90% C.L

A Study of Muon Neutrino Disappearance Using the Fermilab Main Injector Neutrino Beam

We report the results of a search for muon-neutrino disappearance by the Main Injector Neutrino Oscillation Search. The experiment uses two detectors separated by 734 km to observe a beam of neutrinos created by the Neutrinos at the Main Injector facility at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. The data were collected in the first 282 days of beam operations and correspond to an exposure of 1.27e20 protons on target. Based on measurements in the Near Detector, in the absence of neutrino oscillations we expected 336 +/- 14 muon-neutrino charged-current interactions at the Far Detector but observed 215. This deficit of events corresponds to a significance of 5.2 standard deviations. The deficit is energy dependent and is consistent with two-flavor neutrino oscillations according to delta m-squared = 2.74e-3 +0.44/-0.26e-3 eV^2 and sin^2(2 theta) > 0.87 at 68% confidence level.Comment: In submission to Phys. Rev.

Testing Lorentz Invariance and CPT Conservation with NuMI Neutrinos in the MINOS Near Detector

A search for a sidereal modulation in the MINOS near detector neutrino data was performed. If present, this signature could be a consequence of Lorentz and CPT violation as predicted by a class of extensions to the Standard Model. No evidence for a sidereal signal in the data set was found, implying that there is no significant change in neutrino propagation that depends on the direction of the neutrino beam in a sun-centered inertial frame. Upper limits on the magnitudes of the Lorentz and CPT violating terms in these extensions to the Standard Model lie between 0.01-1% of the maximum expected, assuming a suppression of these signatures by factor of $10^{-17}$.

Measurement of neutrino velocity with the MINOS detectors and NuMI neutrino beam

The velocity of a ~3 GeV neutrino beam is measured by comparing detection times at the near and far detectors of the MINOS experiment, separated by 734 km. A total of 473 far detector neutrino events was used to measure (v-c)/c=5.12.910-5 (at 68% C.L.). By correlating the measured energies of 258 charged-current neutrino events to their arrival times at the far detector, a limit is imposed on the neutrino mass of mnu&lt;50 MeV/c2 (99% C.L.)