Electron to Muon Conversion in Low-Energy Electron-Nucleus Scattering

Abstract

We present an estimate of the electron to muon conversion cross section in fixed-target elastic electron scattering. The matrix element $<\mu | j_\mathrm{em}^\mu(0) | e>$ is calculated analytically in two scenarios introducing suitable approximations. We consider on the one hand side the case of three light Dirac neutrinos with CKM-type leptonic mixing and on the other hand a typical see-saw scenario. We evaluate the coulombic contribution to the scattering cross section in the limit of vanishing energy transfer to the nucleus and, thus, obtain a realistic estimate for the total conversion cross section. Although we find that in the see-saw scenario the cross section can be enhanced by as much as twenty orders of magnitude in comparison to the Dirac case, it is still not experimentally accessible.