A Search for Nuetrino Induced NC Coherent $\pi^{0}$ Production in the MINOS Near Detector

The production of single, highly forward $\pi^{0}$ mesons by neutral current (NC) coherent neutrino-nucleus interactions $\left( \nu_{\mu} + N \to \nu_{\mu} + N + \pi^{0}\right) $ is of current interest as a process amenable to phenomenological description, and as a potential background for long base-line $\nu_{\mu} \to \nu_{e}$ oscillation searches. The high-statistic sample of neutrino interactions recorded by the MINOS Near Detector (ND), a coarse-grained iron-scintillator tracking calorimeter, in the $E_{\nu}$ = 2-30 GeV range provide an opportunity to measure the cross-section of this coherent reaction on a relatively high-A nucleus. A major challenge to this measurement is the isolation of forward-going electromagnetic (EM) showers produced by the relatively rare NC coherent process from the abundance of incoherently produced EM showers. These backgrounds result from single $\pi^{0}$ dominated NC resonance and DIS events and by quasi-elastic-like charged-current scattering of electron neutrinos. The methods for event selection, error estimation, and signal extraction will be presented.