Effects of non-standard interactions in the MINOS experiment

We investigate the effects of non-standard interactions on the determination of the neutrino oscillation parameters Delta m(31)(2), theta(23), and theta(13) in the MINOS experiment. We show that adding non-standard interactions to the analysis lead to an extension of the allowed parameter space to larger values of Delta m(31)(2) and smaller theta(23), and basically removes all predictability for theta(13). In addition, we discuss the sensitivities to the non-standard interaction parameters of the MINOS experiment alone. In particular, we examine the degeneracy between theta(13) and the non-standard interaction parameter epsilon(e tau). We find that this degeneracy is responsible for the removal of the theta(13) predictability and that the possible bound on vertical bar epsilon(e tau)vertical bar is competitive with direct bounds only if a more stringent external bound on theta(13) is applied. (c) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.