Measurement of charged-current muon neutrino-argon interactions without pions in the final state using the MicroBooNE detector

Abstract: We report a new measurement of flux-integrated differential cross sections for charged-current (CC) muon neutrino interactions with argon nuclei that produce no final state pions $(\nu_\mu\mathrm{CC}0\pi)$. These interactions are of particular importance as a topologically defined signal dominated by quasielastic-like interactions. This measurement was performed with the MicroBooNE liquid argon time projection chamber detector located at the Fermilab Booster Neutrino Beam (BNB), and uses an exposure of $1.3\times10^{21}$ protons on target collected between 2015 and 2020. The results are presented in terms of single and double-differential cross sections as a function of the final state muon momentum and angle. The data are compared with widely-used neutrino event generators. We find good agreement with the single-differential measurements, while only a subset of generators are also able to adequately describe the data in double-differential distributions. This work facilitates comparison with Cherenkov detector measurements, including those located at the BNB.