Measurement of neutron production in atmospheric neutrino interactions at the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory
Creators: name: SNO Collaboration
name: Aharmim, B.
name: Ahmed, S. N.
name: Anthony, A. E.
name: Barros, N.
name: Beier, E. W.
name: Bellerive, A.
name: Beltran, B.
name: Bergevin, M.
name: Biller, S. D.
name: Bonventre, R.
name: Boudjemline, K.
name: Boulay, M. G.
name: Cai, B.
name: Callaghan, E. J.
name: Caravaca, J.
name: Chan, Y. D.
name: Chauhan, D.
name: Chen, M.
name: Cleveland, B. T.
name: Cox, G. A.
name: Dai, X.
name: Deng, H.
name: Descamps, F. B.
name: Detwiler, J. A.
name: Doe, P. J.
name: Doucas, G.
name: Drouin, P. -L.
name: Dunford, M.
name: Elliott, S. R.
name: Evans, H. C.
name: Ewan, G. T.
name: Farine, J.
name: Fergani, H.
name: Fleurot, F.
name: Ford, R. J.
name: Formaggio, J. A.
name: Gagnon, N.
name: Gilje, K.
name: Goon, J. TM.
name: Graham, K.
name: Guillian, E.
name: Habib, S.
name: Hahn, R. L.
name: Hallin, A. L.
name: Hallman, E. D.
name: Harvey, P. J.
name: Hazama, R.
name: Heintzelman, W. J.
name: Heise, J.
name: Helmer, R. L.
name: Hime, A.
name: Howard, C.
name: Huang, M.
name: Jagam, P.
name: Jamieson, B.
name: Jelley, N. A.
name: Jerkins, M.
name: Keeter, K. J.
name: Klein, J. R.
name: Kormos, L. L.
name: Kos, M.
name: Kruger, A.
name: Kraus, C.
name: Krauss, C. B.
name: Kutter, T.
name: Kyba, C. C. M.
name: Land, B. J.
name: Lange, R.
name: Law, J.
name: Lawson, I. T.
name: Lesko, K. T.
name: Leslie, J. R.
name: Levine, I.
name: Loach, J. C.
name: MacLellan, R.
name: Majerus, S.
name: Mak, H. B.
name: Maneira, J.
name: Martin, R. D.
name: Mastbaum, A.
name: McCauley, N.
name: McDonald, A. B.
name: McGee, S. R.
name: Miller, M. L.
name: Monreal, B.
name: Monroe, J.
name: Nickel, B. G.
name: Noble, A. J.
name: O'Keeffe, H. M.
name: Oblath, N. S.
name: Okada, C. E.
name: Ollerhead, R. W.
name: Gann, G. D. Orebi
name: Oser, S. M.
name: Ott, R. A.
name: Peeters, S. J. M.
name: Poon, A. W. P.
name: Prior, G.
name: Reitzner, S. D.
name: Rielage, K.
name: Robertson, B. C.
name: Robertson, R. G. H.
name: Schwendener, M. H.
name: Secrest, J. A.
name: Seibert, S. R.
name: Simard, O.
name: Sinclair, D.
name: Singh, J.
name: Skensved, P.
name: Smiley, M.
name: Sonley, T. J.
name: Stonehill, L. C.
name: Tesic, G.
name: Tolich, N.
name: Tsui, T.
name: Van Berg, R.
name: VanDevender, B. A.
name: Virtue, C. J.
name: Wall, B. L.
name: Waller, D.
name: Tseung, H. Wan Chan
name: Wark, D. L.
name: Wendland, J.
name: West, N.
name: Wilkerson, J. F.
name: Wilson, J. R.
name: Winchester, T.
name: Wright, A.
name: Yeh, M.
name: Zhang, F.
name: Zuber, K.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2019
Subjects: subject: High Energy Physics - Experiment (hep-ex)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: Neutron production in GeV-scale neutrino interactions is a poorly studied process. We have measured the neutron multiplicities in atmospheric neutrino interactions in the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory experiment and compared them to the prediction of a Monte Carlo simulation using GENIE and a minimally modified version of GEANT4. We analyzed 837 days of exposure corresponding to Phase I, using pure heavy water, and Phase II, using a mixture of Cl in heavy water. Neutrons produced in atmospheric neutrino interactions were identified with an efficiency of $15.3\%$ and $44.3\%$, for Phase I and II respectively. The neutron production is measured as a function of the visible energy of the neutrino interaction and, for charged current quasi-elastic interaction candidates, also as a function of the neutrino energy. This study is also performed classifying the complete sample into two pairs of event categories: charged current quasi-elastic and non charged current quasi-elastic, and $ν_μ$ and $ν_e$. Results show good overall agreement between data and Monte Carlo for both phases, with some small tension with a statistical significance below $2σ$ for some intermediate energies.