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Measurement of single charged pion production in charged-current νμ-Ar interactions with the MicroBooNE detector

P. Abratenko38, D. Andrade Aldana14, L. Arellano22, J. Asaadi37, A. Ashkenazi36, S. Balasubramanian12, B. Baller12, A. Barnard29, G. Barr29 et al. (MicroBooNE Collaboration*)

G. Barr29, D. Barrow29, J. Barrow26, V. Basque12, J. Bateman15,22, B. Behera34, O. Benevides Rodrigues14, S. Berkman25, A. Bhat7, M. Bhattacharya12, V. Bhelande20, M. Bishai3, A. Blake19, B. Bogart24, T. Bolton18, M. B. Brunetti17,40, L. Camilleri10, D. Caratelli4, F. Cavanna12, G. Cerati12, A. Chappell40, Y. Chen33, J. M. Conrad23, M. Convery33, L. Cooper-Troendle30, J. I. Crespo-Anadón6, R. Cross40, M. Del Tutto12, S. R. Dennis5, P. Detje5, A. Devitt19, R. Diurba2, Z. Djurcic1, K. Duffy29, S. Dytman30, B. Eberly35, P. Englezos32, A. Ereditato7,12, J. J. Evans22, C. Fang4, W. Foreman14,20, B. T. Fleming7, D. Franco7, A. P. Furmanski26, F. Gao4, D. Garcia-Gamez13, S. Gardiner12, G. Ge10, S. Gollapinni20, E. Gramellini22, P. Green29, H. Greenlee12, L. Gu19, W. Gu3, R. Guenette22, P. Guzowski22, L. Hagaman7, M. D. Handley5, O. Hen23, C. Hilgenberg26, G. A. Horton-Smith18, A. Hussain18, B. Irwin26, M. S. Ismail30, C. James12, X. Ji27, J. H. Jo3, R. A. Johnson8, D. Kalra10, G. Karagiorgi10, W. Ketchum12, M. Kirby3, T. Kobilarcik12, K. Kumar10, N. Lane15,22, J.-Y. Li11, Y. Li3, K. Lin32, B. R. Littlejohn14, L. Liu12, W. C. Louis20, X. Luo4, T. Mahmud19, N. Majeed18, C. Mariani39, J. Marshall40, N. Martinez18, D. A. Martinez Caicedo34, S. Martynenko3, A. Mastbaum32, I. Mawby19, N. McConkey31, L. Mellet25, J. Mendez21, J. Micallef23,38, A. Mogan9, T. Mohayai16, M. Mooney9, A. F. Moor5, C. D. Moore12, L. Mora Lepin22, M. M. Moudgalya22, S. Mulleriababu2, D. Naples30, A. Navrer-Agasson15, N. Nayak3, M. Nebot-Guinot11, C. Nguyen32, J. Nowak19, N. Oza10, O. Palamara12, N. Pallat26, V. Paolone30, A. Papadopoulou1, V. Papavassiliou28, H. B. Parkinson11, S. F. Pate28, N. Patel19, Z. Pavlovic12, E. Piasetzky36, K. Pletcher25, I. Pophale19, X. Qian3, J. L. Raaf12, V. Radeka3, A. Rafique1, M. Reggiani-Guzzo11, J. Rodriguez Rondon34, M. Rosenberg38, M. Ross-Lonergan20, I. Safa10, D. W. Schmitz7, A. Schukraft12, W. Seligman10, M. H. Shaevitz10, R. Sharankova12, J. Shi5, A. Smith5, E. L. Snider12, S. Söldner-Rembold15, J. Spitz24, M. Stancari12, J. St. John12, T. Strauss12, A. M. Szelc11, N. Taniuchi5, K. Terao33, C. Thorpe22, D. Torbunov3, D. Totani4, M. Toups12, A. Trettin22, Y.-T. Tsai33, J. Tyler18, M. A. Uchida5, T. Usher33, B. Viren3, J. Wang27, M. Weber2, H. Wei21, A. J. White7, S. Wolbers12, T. Wongjirad38, K. Wresilo5, W. Wu30, E. Yandel4,20, T. Yang12, L. E. Yates12, H. W. Yu3, G. P. Zeller12, J. Zennamo12, and C. Zhang3 (MicroBooNE Collaboration*)

  • 1Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), Lemont, Illinois 60439, USA
  • 2Universität Bern, Bern CH-3012, Switzerland
  • 3Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), Upton, New York 11973, USA
  • 4University of California, Santa Barbara, California 93106, USA
  • 5University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB3 0HE, United Kingdom
  • 6Centro de Investigaciones Energéticas, Medioambientales y Tecnológicas (CIEMAT), Madrid E-28040, Spain
  • 7University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637, USA
  • 8University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio 45221, USA
  • 9Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado 80523, USA
  • 10Columbia University, New York, New York 10027, USA
  • 11University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh EH9 3FD, United Kingdom
  • 12Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (FNAL), Batavia, Illinois 60510, USA
  • 13Universidad de Granada, Granada E-18071, Spain
  • 14Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT), Chicago, Illinois 60616, USA
  • 15Imperial College London, London SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom
  • 16Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana 47405, USA
  • 17The University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas 66045, USA
  • 18Kansas State University (KSU), Manhattan, Kansas 66506, USA
  • 19Lancaster University, Lancaster LA1 4YW, United Kingdom
  • 20Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, New Mexico 87545, USA
  • 21Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, Louisiana 70803, USA
  • 22The University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL, United Kingdom
  • 23Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA
  • 24University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA
  • 25Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan 48824, USA
  • 26University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455, USA
  • 27Nankai University, Nankai District, Tianjin 300071, China
  • 28New Mexico State University (NMSU), Las Cruces, New Mexico 88003, USA
  • 29University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3RH, United Kingdom
  • 30University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15260, USA
  • 31Queen Mary University of London, London E1 4NS, United Kingdom
  • 32Rutgers University, Piscataway, New Jersey 08854, USA
  • 33SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Menlo Park, California 94025, USA
  • 34South Dakota School of Mines and Technology (SDSMT), Rapid City, South Dakota 57701, USA
  • 35University of Southern Maine, Portland, Maine 04104, USA
  • 36Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel, 69978
  • 37University of Texas, Arlington, Texas 76019, USA
  • 38Tufts University, Medford, Massachusetts 02155, USA
  • 39Center for Neutrino Physics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Virginia 24061, USA
  • 40University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, United Kingdom

  • *Contact author: microboone_info@fnal.gov

Phys. Rev. D 113, 032007 – Published 10 February, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/t2cw-cdx2

Abstract

We present flux-integrated charged-current νμ cross-section measurements on argon for final states containing exactly one π± and no other hadrons except nucleons. The analysis uses data from the MicroBooNE experiment in the Booster Neutrino Beam, corresponding to 1.11×1021 protons on target. Total and single-differential cross-section measurements are provided within a phase space restricted to muon momenta above 150 MeV, pion momenta above 100 MeV, and muon-pion opening angles smaller than 2.65 rad. Differential cross sections are reported with respect to the scattering angles of the muon and pion relative to the beam direction, their momenta, and their combined opening angle. The differential cross section with respect to muon momentum is based on a subset of selected events with the muon track fully contained in the detector, whereas the cross section with respect to pion momentum is based on a subset of selected events rich in pions that have not hadronically scattered on the argon before coming to rest. The latter has not been measured on argon before. The total cross section is measured as (3.75±0.07(stat)±0.80(syst))×10−38  cm2/Ar at a mean energy of approximately 0.8 GeV. Comparisons of the measured cross sections with predictions from multiple neutrino-nucleus interaction generators show good overall agreement, except at very forward muon angles.

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