Superscaling predictions for neutral current quasielastic neutrino-nucleus scattering

Abstract

The application of superscaling ideas to predict neutral-current (NC) quasielastic (QE) neutrino cross sections is investigated. The relativistic impulse approximation (RIA) using the same relativistic mean field potential (RMF) for both initial and final nucleons — a model that reproduces the experimental (e,e′) scaling function — is used to illustrate our findings. While NC reactions are apparently not well suited for scaling analyses, to a large extent, the RIA-RMF predictions do exhibit superscaling. Independence of the scaled response on the nuclear species is very well fulfilled. The RIA-RMF NC superscaling function is in good agreement with the experimental (e,e′) one. The idea that electroweak processes can be described with a universal scaling function, provided that mild restrictions on the kinematics are assumed, is shown to be valid.