1997/01/13 by L. Ludovici, Ludovici, L., P. Zucchelli +1
Physics and Astronomy · #FOS: Physical sciences #High Energy Physics - Experiment (hep-ex) #hep-ex
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.hep-ex/9701007
16 pages, LaTex, 7 figures and 2 tables
arxiv created 1997/01/13 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30
We study the conceptual feasibility of a high energy, ``short baseline'', zero background experiment to search for muon-neutrino --> electron-neutrino oscillations and fully covering the area where the LSND experiment claims evidence. The natural electron-neutrino background of the muon-neutrino beam, from K and mu decays in the decay tunnel, is suppressed by a hadron blind detector that vetoes, by time coincidence, a possible electron-neutrino signal in the neutrino detector (anti-tagging technique). We discuss this new idea and we study a possible implementation in the old neutrino line of the PS accelerator, which at CERN offers the ideal L/E ratio. In the anti-tagged muon-neutrino beam, the electron-neutrino contamination can be reduced by more than two orders of magnitude over conventional beams, down to 5*10-5. In an ideal appearance experiment using a 300 t detector one would expect after two years 112 events according to the LSND result, with a background of 1.1-2.4 events. In case of a negative search, the 90% C.L. upper limit in the mixing angle would be sin2 < 1.8*10-4 for large Delta(m2) and Delta(m2) <3.3*10-2 eV2 for maximal mixing.