Panel 1: 3-Flavor Neutrino Oscillation
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Panel 1: 3-flavor Neutrino Oscillation Marcos Dracos,1 Mark Hartz,2, 3 Patrick Huber,4 Ryan Patterson,5 Serguey Petcov,6 and Ewa Rondio7 1IPHC, Universit´ede Strasbourg, CNRS/IN2P3, F-67037 Strasbourg, France 2TRIUMF, Canada 3Kavli IPMU (WPI), University of Tokyo 4Center for Neutrino Physics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, USA 5California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, USA 6SISSA/INFN, Trieste, Italy, and Kavli IPMU (WPI), University of Tokyo, Kashiwa, Japan 7National Centre for Nuclear Research (NCBJ), Warsaw, Poland (Dated: November 6, 2018) PREAMBLE tence of new fundamental symmetry in the lepton sector. The most distinctive feature of the symmetry approach to In this brief document we will focus on experimental neutrino mixing are the predictions of the values of some programs and ideas which have at some level been rec- of the neutrino mixing angles and leptonic CP phases, ognized by funding agencies, either by outright funding and/or of existence of correlations between the values of them or by at least providing significant support for the at least some the neutrino mixing angles and/or between R&D for the neutrino oscillation related aspects of the the values of the neutrino mixing angles and the Dirac program. CP phase in the PMNS matrix, etc. This implies that a sufficiently precise measurement of the Dirac phase δ of the PMNS neutrino mixing matrix in current and future neutrino oscillation experiments, combined with planned INTRODUCTION improvements of the precision on the neutrino mixing an- gles, might provide unique information about the possible The discovery of neutrino oscillation dates back two discrete symmetry origin of the observed pattern of neu- decades and to this day is the most direct laboratory ev- trino mixing and, correspondingly, about the existence of idence for the existence of physics beyond the Standard new fundamental symmetry in the lepton sector. Thus, Model (SM). Our theoretical understanding is lagging these experiments will not simply provide high precision behind the experimental results in this field: neutrino data on neutrino mixing and Dirac CP parameters, but physics remains data driven. In the absence of a gen- will probe at fundamental level the origin of the observed erally accepted theory of flavor, the only path forward form of neutrino mixing. In order for this probe to be is to study neutrinos, and specifically for this write-up, really effective one should aim at measuring the solar, neutrino oscillations, at ever increasing precision. The atmospheric and reactor neutrino mixing angle parame- goal is to either find discrepancies relative to 3-flavor os- 2 2 2 ters sin θ12, sin θ23 and sin θ13 with 1σ relative uncer- cillations or to discover patterns and correlations among tainties not exceeding approximately 0.7%, 3% and 3%, neutrino properties, which would guide us towards a the- respectively, and the Dirac CP violation phase δ with 1σ ory of flavor. uncertainty of approximately 10◦ at δ ∼ 270◦. Discrepancies with respect to 3-flavor oscillations can arise for a number of reasons, Wolfenstein proposed new interactions of neutrinos with quarks, but more exotic proposals exist, like neutrinos travelling through extra- dimensions. The enormous success of the SM in direct tests is tempered by the fact that the SM only describes about 5% of the energy content of the Universe. Leaving There is a global effort in neutrino oscillation physics, us with so-called portals: these are SM operators which notably NOvA and T2K are currently running and are are neutral under the SM gauge groups and thus can mix providing a first glimpse of CP violation in the lepton with dark-sector counterparts. There is a limited number sector. JUNO in China will study oscillations of reactor of these portals, and for fermions this portal is realized antineutrinos related to the solar mass splitting starting by neutrinos. Neutrino oscillation is an interference phe- in the early 2020s. Later in the same decade, DUNE in nomenon over long distances and therefore exquisitely the U.S. and Hyper-K in Japan will study leptonic CP sensitive to even the smallest new contributions to the violation with great precision. Neutrino physics has be- phase evolution of mass eigenstates. come big science with collaborations of a size comparable Most flavor theories invoke some type of symmetry, to the LHC experiments. In the U.S. and Asia neutrino the observed pattern of neutrino mixing and the specific physics has taken center stage, at least for now, and the form of the neutrino mixing can have its origin in the exis- question is what role will Europe play? 2 STATUS QUO ence which has to taken into account in interpreting the experimental measurements. Realistically, with current Experiments with solar, atmospheric, reactor and ac- neutrino sources, the only channel available for experi- celerator neutrinos have provided compelling evidence for ments is electron (anti)neutrino appearance in a muon oscillations of neutrinos, which in turn implies a non-zero (anti)neutrino beam: νµ ! νe andν ¯µ ! ν¯e. neutrino mass. Presently oscillation parameters within The first hint of possible CP violation for neutrinos the 3-flavor framework are measured with few per cent came from T2K, which showed a preference for δCP close level accuracy. This knowledge is based on contribu- to − π=2 (maximal CP violation) [25]. Since that time, tions made by many experiments. Disappearance of so- with significantly more data collected, T2K sees an excess of electron neutrino events and no statistically significant lar νe, reactorν ¯e and of atmospheric νµ andν ¯µ due to oscillations have been observed respectively, in solar neu- rate of electron antineutrino events [26]-[28], leading to trino [1]-[9], KamLAND [10, 11] and Super-Kamiokande a 95% C.L. exclusion of the CP conserving values δCP = [12, 13] experiments. Precision in this measurements has 0; π [30]. NOvA recently achieved first evidence (>4σ reached a level where 3-flavor treatment of oscillations is C.L.) of electron antineutrino appearance. The combined necessary for all experiments. fit of all NOvA oscillation channels prefers δCP values between 0 and π, but the results are compatible with The absolute values of the mass squared differences those of T2K [29]. have been measured. The sign of the ∆m2 is known 21 The trends and preferred values of the oscillation pa- thanks to the matter effects in the Sun (called MSW ef- rameters can be well observed in global fits, where all fect [24]), but the sign of ∆m2 is still to be determined 31 available data sets are used as inputs. An example of and constitutes one of the important open questions such fit using data available at the beginning of 2018 (mass hierarchy { MH) for upcoming measurements. An published in [31], where the detailed status of our knowl- answer possibly could come from global fits, current ex- edge about oscillation parameters is discussed. Presently periments, in particular NOvA and future experiments these fits show that for the CP violation parameter δ using atmospheric neutrinos (INO, PINGU, ORCA) and CP values around π=2 are strongly disfavoured while −π=2 from JUNO, which is specifically designed for this pur- is preferred. For sin2 θ the maximal mixing is still al- pose. 23 lowed and but the preferred region is θ23 > π=4, for mass All three mixing angles are presently known, although ordering the normal mass hierarchy is favored, but the with different precision [19]. There is an open question preference is weak. if the value of θ23 corresponds to maximal mixing, π/4, During the next few years additional data will be ob- which is equivalent to equal νµ and ντ components of tained from the T2K and NOvA experiments, where the ν3 mass eigenstate. If it is not maximal, one would more data is being collected with neutrino and antineu- like to know in which octant it lies. The most current trino beams with increasing intensities. These two ex- global fits, see for instance [20] to all available data have periments could provide better constraints for the above a best fit of θ23 which is not maximal and that allows for mentioned parameters, and reduce the allowed parame- two degenerate solutions, one in the lower octant (θ23 < ter space, but measurements with exclusions at the level π=4) and the other one in the upper octant (θ23 > π=4); of 4 − 5σ for δCP can be obtained only from the next however maximal mixing is still consistent with the data. generation of experiments. T2K and the atmospheric experiments (Super- The T2K (phase II) and NOvA experiments are go- Kamiokande, IceCube, Antares) tend to see the θ23 angle ing to continue to take data until the next generation of 2 closer to maximal, with best fit points for sin θ23 re- neutrino oscillation experiments comes on-line, which are ported at NEUTRINO 2018 conference than NOvA and expected to start around 2026. If the true δCP is close to an older long-baseline experiment, MINOS (which has current global best fits, the expected results from com- already finished to take data). bined analysis of both experiments could allow for: the The measurement of θ13 reached very high preci- exclusion of CP conservation at 3σ significance; determi- sion in the second generation reactor experiments, Daya nation of the neutrino mass hierarchy at 4σ significance; ◦ Bay [21], Reno [22] and Double Chooz [23] opening pos- a precise determination of θ23 with an uncertainty of 1.7 2 sibility of search for CP violation in neutrino oscillations. or better; a precise measurement of ∆m31 with about 1% The CP violation parameter is not well constrained precision. at this point. The observation of CP violation in lep- ton sector would be interesting, as it may help to un- derstand the matter-antimatter asymmetry observed in JUNO, DUNE AND HYPER-K the Universe.