Status and physics potential of the JUNO experiment

The Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) is a 20 kton multipurpose liquid scintillator detector with an unprecedented energy resolution of 3% at 1 MeV being built in a dedicated underground laboratory in China and expected to start data taking in 2021. The main physics goal of the experiment is the determination of the neutrino mass hierarchy with a significance of 3-4 sigma within six years of running using electron antineutrinos coming from two nuclear power plants at a baseline of about 53 km. Beyond this fundamental question, JUNO will also have a very rich physics program including the precise measurement at a sub-percent level of the solar neutrino oscillation parameters, the detection of low-energy neutrinos coming from galactic core-collapse supernova, diffuse supernova background, the Sun and the Earth (geo-neutrinos). This manuscript will give an overview on the JUNO physics potential and the current status of the project.