Coherent Production Of Single Pions And Rho-Mesons In Charged-Current Interactions Of Neutrinos And Antineutrinos On Neon Nuclei At The Fermilab Tevatron

The coherent production of pi and rho mesons in nu(mu) (nu(mu)BAR)-neon charged-current interactions has been studied using the Fermilab 15-foot bubble chamber filled with a heavy Ne-H-2 mix and exposed to the Tevatron quadrupole triplet (anti)neutrino beam. The nu(mu) (nu(mu)BAR) beam had an average energy of 80 GeV (70 GeV). From a sample corresponding to approximately 28 000 charged-current interactions, net signals of (53 +/- 9) mu+/- pi-/+ coherent events and (19 +/- 7) mu+/- pi-/+ pi0 coherent events are extracted. For E > 10 GeV, the coherent pion production cross section is determined to be (3.2 +/- 0.7) X 10(-38) cm2 per neon nucleus whereas the coherent rho production cross section is (2.1 +/- 0.8) x 10(-38) cm2 per neon nucleus. These cross sections and the kinematical characteristics of the coherent events at Absolute value of t < 0.1 GeV2 are found to be in general agreement with the predictions of a model based on the hadron dominance and, in the pion case, on the partially conserved axial-vector current hypothesis. Also discussed is the coherent production of systems consisting of three pions.