TRIDENT: A Next-Generation Neutrino Telescope in the South China Sea

While cosmic rays were first discovered over a century ago, the source of the most extreme-energy components remains unknown. Discovering astrophysical neutrino sources would provide smoking gun evidence for ultra-high energy cosmic ray production. The IceCube Neutrino Observatory discovered a diffuse astrophysical neutrino flux in 2013 and observed the first compelling evidence for a high-energy neutrino source in 2017. Next-generation telescopes with improved sensitivity are required to resolve this diffuse neutrino flux. The TRopIcal DEep-sea Neutrino Telescope (TRIDENT) will instrument ~8km^3 of seawater with optical detection modules ~3.5km deep in the South China Sea. TRIDENT's primary goal is to rapidly resolve point sources from the measured diffuse neutrino flux, achieving this through its size, novel location near the equator and use of advanced photon detection technologies. TRIDENT is also designed to be sensitive to all neutrino flavours. With this, discovery of astrophysical neutrino sources will open up a new arena for probing high-energy particle acceleration mechanisms, testing fundamental physics of high-energy neutrinos and measuring neutrino oscillation over astronomical baselines.