Low Energy Threshold Analysis of the Phase I and Phase II Data Sets of the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory

Abstract

Results are reported from a joint analysis of Phase I and Phase II data from the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory. The effective electron kinetic energy threshold used is Teff = 3.5 MeV, the lowest analysis threshold yet achieved with water Cherenkov detector data. In units of 106 cm−2 s−1, the total flux of active-flavor neutrinos from 8B decay in the Sun measured using the neutral current (NC) reaction of neutrinos on deuterons, with no constraint on the 8B neutrino energy spectrum, is found to be (NC) = 5.140 +0.160 −0.158(stat) +0.132 −0.117(syst). These uncertainties are more than a factor of two smaller than previously published results. Also presented are the spectra of recoil electrons from the charged current reaction of neutrinos on deuterons and the elastic scattering of electrons. A fit to the SNO data in which the free parameters directly describe the total 8B neutrino flux and the energy-dependent ve survival probability provides a measure of the total 8B neutrino flux Φ8B = 5.046 +0.159 −0.152(stat) +0.107 −0.123(syst). Combining these new results with results of all other solar experiments and the KamLAND reactor experiment yields best-fit values of the mixing parameters of Θ12 = 34.06 +1.16 −0.84 degrees and Δm2 21 = 7.59 +0.20 −0.21 × 10^−5 eV2. The global value of Φ8B is extracted to a precision of +2.38 −2.95%. In a three-flavor analysis the best fit value of sin^2Θ13 is 2.00+2.09 −1.63 × 10−2. This implies an upper bound of sin^2Θ13 < 0.057 (95% C.L.).