Ambiguity of the final state interaction for neutral-current neutrino-nucleus scattering in the quasielastic region.

We investigate the effect of final state interaction (FSI) on the neutrino (antineutrino) scattering via neutral current from a 12C target in the quasielastic region within the framework of a relativistic single-particle model. Three different descriptions of the FSI, which are a relativistic mean field, a complex optical potential, and its real potential, are taken into account for two incident neutrino energies of 500 MeV and 1 GeV. The effects of the FSI are studied not only on the differential cross sections but also on each longitudinal, transverse, and transverse interference cross section. We found that the FSI description may play a vital role for the estimation of those cross sections, and the FSI effects on each response cross section may differ from those on the differential cross section. However, the asymmetry between neutrino and antineutrino scattering cross sections turns out to be nearly independent of the FSI descriptions. Finally, possible FSI effects on the MiniBooNE data are studied in detail. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]