Emission of neutron–proton and proton–proton pairs in neutrino scattering

Abstract

We use a recently developed model of relativistic meson-exchange currents to compute the neutron–proton and proton–proton yields in (νμ,μ−) scattering from 12C in the 2p–2h channel. We compute the response functions and cross sections with the relativistic Fermi gas model for different kinematics from intermediate to high momentum transfers. We find a large contribution of neutron–proton configurations in the initial state, as compared to proton–proton pairs. In the case of charge-changing neutrino scattering the 2p–2h cross section of proton–proton emission (i.e., np in the initial state) is much larger than for neutron–proton emission (i.e., two neutrons in the initial state) by a (ω,q)-dependent factor. The different emission probabilities of distinct species of nucleon pairs are produced in our model only by meson-exchange currents, mainly by the Δ isobar current. We also analyze other effects including exchange contributions and the effect of the axial and vector currents.