The Case for Muon-based Neutrino Beams

Abstract

For the foreseeable future, high energy physics accelerator capabilities in the US will be deployed to study the physics of the neutrino sector. In this context, it is useful to explore the sensitivities and limiting systematic effects of the planned neutrino oscillation program, so that we can evaluate the issues that must be addressed in order to ensure the success of these efforts. It is only in this way that we will ultimately be able to elucidate the fundamental physics processes involved. We conclude that success can only be guaranteed by, at some point in the future, being able to deploy muon accelerator capabilities. Such capabilities provide the only route to precision neutrino beams with which to study and mitigate, at the sub-percent level, the limiting systematic issues of future oscillation measurements. Thus this analysis argues strongly for maintaining a viable accelerator research program towards future muon accelerator capabilities.