| Summary: | We study neutrino-induced charged-current (CC) π
0 production on carbon nuclei using events
with fully imaged final-state proton-π
0
systems. Novel use of final-state correlations based on
transverse kinematic imbalance enable the first measurements of the struck nucleon’s Fermi motion,
of the intranuclear momentum transfer (IMT) dynamics, and of the final-state hadronic momentum
configuration in neutrino pion production. Event distributions are presented for i) the momenta of
neutrino-struck neutrons below the Fermi surface, ii) the direction of missing transverse momentum
characterizing the strength of IMT, and iii) proton-pion momentum imbalance with respect to the
lepton scattering plane. The observed Fermi motion and IMT strength are compared to the previous
MINERνA measurement of neutrino CC quasielastic-like production. The measured shapes and
absolute rates of these distributions, as well as the cross-section asymmetries show tensions with
predictions from current neutrino generator models.
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