Lorentz violation and short-baseline neutrino experiments

Abstract

A general discussion is given of signals for broken Lorentz symmetry in short-baseline neutrino experiments. Among the effects that Lorentz violation can introduce are a dependence on energy differing from that of the usual massive-neutrino solution and a dependence on the direction of neutrino propagation. Using the published result of the Liquid Scintillator Neutrino Detector experiment, analysis of the effects of broken Lorentz symmetry yields an estimated nonzero value $(3 \pm 1) × 10^{-19}$ $\text{GeV}$ for a combination of coefficients for Lorentz violation. This lies in the range expected for effects originating from the Planck scale in an underlying unified theory.