Abstract
We have carefully examined, in both analytical and numerical ways, how small the terrestrial matter effects can be in a given medium-baseline reactor antineutrino oscillation experiment like JUNO or RENO-50. Taking the forthcoming JUNO experiment as an example, we show that the inclusion of terrestrial matter effects may reduce the sensitivity of the neutrino mass ordering measurement by and a neglect of such effects may shift the best-fit values of the flavor mixing angle θ12 and the neutrino mass-squared difference Δ21 by about 1σ to 2σ in the future data analysis. In addition, a preliminary estimate indicates that a 2σ sensitivity of establishing the terrestrial matter effects can be achieved for about 10 years of data taking at JUNO with the help of a suitable near detector implementation.
Highlights
The approved JUNO project in China is a flagship of the new-generation medium-baseline reactor antineutrino oscillation experiments [1, 2], and its primary physics target is to probe the intriguing neutrino mass ordering [3, 4]
In the present work we aim to evaluate how small the terrestrial matter effects are and whether they can more or less affect the precision measurements to be done in the JUNO and RENO-50 experiments
Taking the ongoing JUNO experiment as an example, we show that the inclusion of terrestrial matter effects may reduce the sensitivity of the neutrino mass ordering measurement by ∆χ2MO ≃ 0.6, and a neglect of such effects may shift the best-fit values of the flavor mixing angle θ12 and the neutrino mass-squared difference ∆21 by about 1σ to 2σ in the future data analysis
Summary
The approved JUNO project in China is a flagship of the new-generation medium-baseline reactor antineutrino oscillation experiments [1, 2], and its primary physics target is to probe the intriguing neutrino mass ordering [3, 4] (i.e., whether m1 < m2 < m3 or m3 < m1 < m2). We turn to a numerical study of the terrestrial matter effects in a medium-baseline reactor antineutrino oscillation experiment like JUNO or RENO-50.
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