Muon-neutrino-induced charged-current pion production on nuclei

Background: Long-baseline experiments such as T2K, NOvA, or the planned Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment require theoretical descriptions of the complete event in a neutrino-nucleus reaction. Since nuclear targets are used this requires a good understanding of neutrino-nucleus interactions.

Purpose: One of the dominant reaction channels in neutrino-nucleus interactions is pion production. This paper aims for a theoretically consistent treatment of all charged current charged pion production data that are available from the experiments MiniBooNE, the near detector experiment at T2K, and MINERvA.

Method: Pion production is treated through excitations of nucleon resonances, including background terms, and deep inelastic scattering. The final state interactions of the produced pions are described within the Giessen-Boltzmann-Uehling-Uhlenbeck implementation of quantum-kinetic transport theory.

Results: Results are given for MiniBooNE, the near detector experiment at T2K and for MINERvA. While the theoretical results for MiniBooNE differ from the data both in shape and magnitude, their agreement both with the T2K and the MINERvA data is good for all pion and lepton observables. Predictions for pion spectra are shown for MicroBooNE and NOvA.

Conclusions: Based on the GiBUU model of lepton-nucleus interactions a consistent, good theoretical description of CC charged pion production data from the T2K ND and the MINERvA experiments is possible, without any parameter tunes.

Figure 1

Kinetic energy spectrum per nucleon of positively charged pions in the MiniBooNE flux for a ${\mathrm{CH}}_2$ target. Data are from [39].

Figure 2

Momentum spectrum per nucleon of positively charged pions in the T2K ND280 flux for a ${\mathrm{H}}_2\mathrm{O}$ target. Data are from [40]. For the kinematical cuts used both in the experiment and the calculations, see text.

Figure 3

Angular distribution of positively charged pions in the T2K ND280 flux for a ${\mathrm{H}}_2\mathrm{O}$ target. Data are from [40].

Figure 4

Momentum distribution of muons associated with positively charged pions in the T2K ND280 flux for a ${\mathrm{H}}_2\mathrm{O}$ target. Data are from [40].

Figure 5

Angular distribution of muons connected with positively charged pions in the T2K ND280 flux for a ${\mathrm{H}}_2\mathrm{O}$ target. Data are from [40].

Figure 6

Kinetic energy spectrum per nucleon of single charged pions in the MINERvA flux for a CH target with $W<1.4$ GeV. Data are from [9].

Figure 7

Angular distribution of single charged pions in the MINERvA flux for a CH target with $W<1.4$ GeV. Data are from [9].

Figure 8

Kinetic energy spectrum per nucleon of multiple charged pions in the MINERvA flux for a CH target with $W_{\mathrm{rec}}<1.8$ GeV (solid line). The dashed line gives the one-pion contribution. Data are from [10].

Figure 9

Angular distribution of multiple charged pions in the MINERvA flux for a CH target with $W_{\mathrm{rec}}<1.8$ GeV. The dashed curve gives the angular distribution of one-pion events. Data are from [10].

Figure 10

Momentum distribution of outgoing muons for multiple charged pion production in the MINERvA flux for a CH target with $W_{\mathrm{rec}}<1.8$ GeV. Data are from [10].

Figure 11

Angular distribution of outgoing muons for multiple charged pion production in the MINERvA flux for a CH target with $W_{\mathrm{rec}}<1.8$ GeV. Data are from [10].

Figure 12

$Q^2$ distribution of multiple charged pions in the MINERvA flux for a CH target with $W_{\mathrm{rec}}<1.8$ GeV. Data are from [10].

Figure 13

Kinetic energy spectrum of positively charged pions in the BNB flux for a ${}^{40}\mathrm{Ar}$ target (MicroBooNE). The dashed line gives the spectrum for single ${\pi }^{+}$ production, the solid line that for events with at least 1 ${\pi }^{+}$.

Figure 14

Kinetic energy spectrum per nucleon of positively charged pions in the NOvA flux at the ND. The dashed line gives the spectrum for single ${\pi }^{+}$ production, the solid line that for events with at least 1 ${\pi }^{+}$. The lowest, dashed-dotted curve shows the contribution to single $\pi$ production through the $\mathrm{\Delta }$ resonance.

Figure 15

Kinetic energy spectrum per nucleon of positively charged pions in the NOvA flux at the ND. The solid lines give the spectrum for events with at least 1 ${\pi }^{+}$ plus possibly other mesons, the dashed lines that for events with exactly 1 ${\pi }^{+}$. The two upper curves (solid and dashed) describe a H target, the two lower curves a C target.