Abstract: | The Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) is proposed to determine
the neutrino mass hierarchy using an underground liquid scintillator detector.
It is located 53 km away from both Yangjiang and Taishan Nuclear Power Plants
in Guangdong, China. The experimental hall, spanning more than 50 meters, is
under a granite mountain of over 700 m overburden. Within six years of running,
the detection of reactor antineutrinos from Yangjiang and Taishan Nuclear Power
Plants can resolve the neutrino mass hierarchy at a confidence level of
3-4$sigma$. Meanwhile, the excellent energy resolution and large fiducial
volume will lead to precise determination of the neutrino oscillation
parameters $sin^2 heta_{12}$, $Delta m^2_{21}$, and $|Delta m^2_{ee}|$ to
an accuracy of better than 1%. As a multipurpose underground neutrino
observatory, the JUNO detector can also observe neutrinos/antineutrinos from
terrestrial and extra-terrestrial sources, including the supernova burst
neutrinos, diffused supernova neutrinos, geoneutrinos, atmospheric neutrinos
and solar neutrinos, which provide exciting opportunities to address important
topics in neutrino and astro-particle physics. JUNO is also sensitive to new
physics beyond the Standard Model, including sterile neutrinos, neutrinos from
dark-matter annihilation, proton decays, as well as scenarios of nonstandard
neutrino interactions and Lorentz/CPT invariance violations. |