Comment on the possible electron neutrino excess in the Super-Kamiokande atmospheric neutrino experiment

Abstract

We investigate the implications of a possible excess of the electron neutrino events in the Super-Kamiokande atmospheric neutrino experiment. The excess, if real, leads to constraints on the ${\nu }_{\mu }\leftrightarrow {\nu }_e$, ${\nu }_{\mu }\leftrightarrow {\nu }_{\tau }$ and ${\nu }_e\leftrightarrow {\nu }_{\tau }$ oscillation parameters. Specifically, the excess impies that ${\nu }_e-{\nu }_{\mu }$ and ${\nu }_{\mu }-{\nu }_{\tau }$ mixings are large and ${\nu }_e-{\nu }_{\tau }$ mixing is small. We show that the electron neutrino excess favors the large mixing angle MSW solution of the solar neutrino problem.

Comments: 8 pages, REVTEX, a revised version with more references and minor modifications