The STEREO experiment is a very short baseline reactor antineutrino experiment. It is designed to test the hypothesis of light sterile neutrinos being the cause of a deficit of the observed antineutrino interaction rate at short baselines with respect to the predicted rate, known as the reactor antineutrino anomaly. The STEREO experiment measures the antineutrino energy spectrum in six identical detector cells covering baselines between 9 and 11 m from the compact core of the ILL research reactor. In this article, results from 179 days of reactor turned on and 235 days of reactor turned off are reported at a high degree of detail. The current results include improvements in the modelling of detector optical properties and the gamma-cascade after neutron captures by gadolinium, the treatment of backgrounds, and the statistical method of the oscillation analysis. Using a direct comparison between antineutrino spectra of all cells, largely independent of any flux prediction, we find the data compatible with the null oscillation hypothesis. The best-fit point of the reactor antineutrino anomaly is rejected at more than 99.9% C.L.
Data from Figure 30 – Relative comparison between the estimated rates of IBD events $A_{l,i}$ (for cell $l$ and energy bin $i$) and the fitted no-oscillation model $M_{l,i}(0, 0, \vec{\alpha})~\phi_i$ as a function of reconstructed energy $E_\text{rec}$ after a fit to phase-I+II data. Due to less statistics, the highest energy bin is excluded from the oscillation analysis in phase-I. For technical reasons, its value is set equal to zero in this dataset. A graphical presentation can be downloaded at "Resources" for reference.
Data from Figure 30 – Relative comparison between the estimated rates of IBD events $A_{l,i}$ (for cell $l$ and energy bin $i$) and the fitted no-oscillation model $M_{l,i}(0, 0, \vec{\alpha})~\phi_i$ as a function of reconstructed energy $E_\text{rec}$ after a fit to phase-I+II data. Due to less statistics, the highest energy bin is excluded from the oscillation analysis in phase-I. For technical reasons, its value is set equal to zero in this dataset. A graphical presentation can be downloaded at "Resources" for reference.
Data from Figure 30 – Relative comparison between the estimated rates of IBD events $A_{l,i}$ (for cell $l$ and energy bin $i$) and the re-normalised no-oscillation model $\phi_i M_{l,i}(\sin^2(2\theta_{ee}) = 0)$ as a function of reconstructed energy $E_\text{rec}$ after a fit to phase-I+II data. Due to less statistics, the highest energy bin is excluded from the oscillation analysis in phase-I. For technical reasons, its value is set equal to zero in this dataset. A full graphical presentation can be downloaded at "Resources" for reference.
A new algorithm is presented to discriminate reconstructed hadronic decays of tau leptons ($\tau_\mathrm{h}$) that originate from genuine tau leptons in the CMS detector against $\tau_\mathrm{h}$ candidates that originate from quark or gluon jets, electrons, or muons. The algorithm inputs information from all reconstructed particles in the vicinity of a $\tau_\mathrm{h}$ candidate and employs a deep neural network with convolutional layers to efficiently process the inputs. This algorithm leads to a significantly improved performance compared with the previously used one. For example, the efficiency for a genuine $\tau_\mathrm{h}$ to pass the discriminator against jets increases by 10-30% for a given efficiency for quark and gluon jets. Furthermore, a more efficient $\tau_\mathrm{h}$ reconstruction is introduced that incorporates additional hadronic decay modes. The superior performance of the new algorithm to discriminate against jets, electrons, and muons and the improved $\tau_\mathrm{h}$ reconstruction method are validated with LHC proton-proton collision data at $\sqrt{s} =$ 13 TeV.
An emulsion spectrometer has been built and tested with pion beams in a 0.7 T magnetic field. A momentum resolution, Δ P / P =13%±1%, has been obtained for 5 and 10 GeV /c particles.
This article reports the measurement of the $^{235}$U-induced antineutrino spectrum shape by the STEREO experiment. 43'000 antineutrinos have been detected at about 10 m from the highly enriched core of the ILL reactor during 118 full days equivalent at nominal power. The measured inverse beta decay spectrum is unfolded to provide a pure $^{235}$U spectrum in antineutrino energy. A careful study of the unfolding procedure, including a cross-validation by an independent framework, has shown that no major biases are introduced by the method. A significant local distortion is found with respect to predictions around $E_\nu \simeq 5.3$ MeV. A gaussian fit of this local excess leads to an amplitude of $A = 12.1 \pm 3.4\%$ (3.5$\sigma$).
A search is presented for production of a heavy up-type quark ($t^\prime$) together with its antiparticle, assuming a significant branching ratio for subsequent $t^\prime$ decay into a Standard Model Higgs boson and a top quark, as predicted by vector-like quark models. The search is based on 14.3 fb$^{-1}$ of $pp$ collisions at $\sqrt{s}=8$ TeV recorded in 2012 with the ATLAS detector at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. Data are analysed in the lepton+jets final state, characterised by an isolated electron or muon with moderately high transverse momentum, significant missing transverse momentum, and at least six jets. The search exploits the high total transverse momenta of all final state objects and the high multiplicity of $b$ jets characteristic of signal events with at least one Higgs boson decaying into $b\bar{b}$, to discriminate against the dominant background from top quark pair production. No significant excess of events above the Standard Model expectation is observed, and upper limits are derived for vector-like quarks of various masses in the two-dimensional plane of $BR(t^\prime \to Wb)$ versus $BR(t^\prime \to Ht)$, where $H$ is the Standard Model Higgs boson, assumed to have a mass of $125$ GeV. Under the branching ratio assumptions corresponding to a weak-isospin doublet (singlet) scenario, a $t^\prime$ quark with mass lower than 790 (640) GeV is excluded at the 95\% confidence level.
The Transition Radiation Detector (TRD) was designed and built to enhance the capabilities of the ALICE detector at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). While aimed at providing electron identification and triggering, the TRD also contributes significantly to the track reconstruction and calibration in the central barrel of ALICE. In this paper the design, construction, operation, and performance of this detector are discussed. A pion rejection factor of up to 410 is achieved at a momentum of 1 GeV/$c$ in p-Pb collisions and the resolution at high transverse momentum improves by about 40% when including the TRD information in track reconstruction. The triggering capability is demonstrated both for jet, light nuclei, and electron selection.
This paper completes the detailed presentation of our PV experiment on the 6S1/2 - 7S1/2 transition in Cs. A detailed description of the data acquisition and processing is given. The results of two independent measurements made on ΔF = 0 and ΔF =1 hfs components agree, providing an important cross-check. After a complete reanalysis of systematics and calibration, the precision is slightly improved, leading to the weighted average Im Epv 1/β = - 1.52 ± 0.18 mV/cm. Later results from an independent group agree quite well. With the semi-empirical value β = (26.8 ± 0.8) a30, our result yields Epv1 = (- 0.79 ± 0.10) x 10-11 i |e|a0. Coupled with the atomic calculations, this implies that the weak nuclear charge of Cs is Qw = -68 ± 9. This value agrees with the standard electroweak theory and leads to a weak interaction angle sin2 θ W = 0.21 ± 0.04. The complementarity of these measurements with high energy experiments is illustrated.
A simple, large-solid-angle apparatus, specially suited for the measurement of backward elastic scattering of medium-energy pions on protons and deuterons, is described. The method of analysis which reduces background and determines elastic events from a data sample of 185 MeV negative pions incident on a D 2 O target is discussed. Results for 141 MeV π + p and 185 MeV π − p backward cross-sections are also presented and compared with cross-sections calculated from known phase shifts.
Measurements of particle emission from a replica of the T2K 90 cm-long carbon target were performed in the NA61/SHINE experiment at CERN SPS, using data collected during a high-statistics run in 2009. An efficient use of the long-target measurements for neutrino flux predictions in T2K requires dedicated reconstruction and analysis techniques. Fully-corrected differential yields of $\pi^\pm$-mesons from the surface of the T2K replica target for incoming 31 GeV/c protons are presented. A possible strategy to implement these results into the T2K neutrino beam predictions is discussed and the propagation of the uncertainties of these results to the final neutrino flux is performed.
The excitation functions for positive pion production from hydrogen have been obtained in the energy region from 230 Mev to 450 Mev and at laboratory pion angles of 24°, 38°, 53°, 73°, 93°, 115°, 140°, and 160°. The pions are detected and identified by measuring their range and ionization in a scintillation counter telescope. The above data are analyzed to give the angular distributions in the center-of-momentum system, and a least-squares analysis made to determine coefficients in σ(θ)=A+Bcosθ+Ccos2θ. The total cross section shows a peak at 300 Mev of magnitude 2.20×10−28 cm2. The coefficient B passes through a maximum negative value at 250 Mev and then passes through zero at 325 Mev and remains positive up to the highest energy measured.
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