Trident: A Mission to Explore Triton, a Candidate Ocean World

Triton: Scientific MotivationNeptune’s moon Triton is one of the most interesting and surprising targets observed by Voyager. During its distant flyby in 1989, Voyager 2 captured a series of images, mostly of the southern, sub-Neptune hemisphere, establishing Triton as one of a rare class of solar system bodies with a substantial atmosphere and active geology. It is believed that Triton began as of a Dwarf Planet originating in the KBO, and subsequently captured by Neptune. It nor exists as Neptune’s icy satellite, and is subject to a tidal, radiolytic, and collisional environment. It is this duality as both captured dwarf planet and large icy satellite that has undergone extreme collisional and tidal processing that gives us a unique target for understanding two of the Solar System's principal constituencies and the fundamental processes that govern their evolution. Thus, comparisons between Triton and other icy objects will facilitate re-interpretation of existing data and maximize the return from prior NASA missions, including New Horizons, Galileo, Cassini and Dawn.Triton’s surface and atmosphere are remarkable, but poorly understood. They hint at on-going geological activity, suggesting an active interior and a possible subsurface ocean. Crater counts suggest a typical surface age of