Low-energy neutrino factory design

Abstract

The design of a low-energy (4GeV) neutrino factory (NF) is described, along with its expected performance. The neutrino factory uses a high-energy proton beam to produce charged pions. The π± decay to produce muons (μ±), which are collected, accelerated, and stored in a ring with long straight sections. Muons decaying in the straight sections produce neutrino beams. The scheme is based on previous designs for higher energy neutrino factories, but has an improved bunching and phase rotation system, and new acceleration, storage ring, and detector schemes tailored to the needs of the lower energy facility. Our simulations suggest that the NF scheme we describe can produce neutrino beams generated by ∼1.4×1021 μ+ per year decaying in a long straight section of the storage ring, and a similar number of μ- decays. © 2009 The American Physical Society.