Physics of collisionless reconnection in a stressed X-point collapse
- Joule Physics Laboratory, Institute for Materials Research, University of Salford, Manchester, M5 4WT (United Kingdom)
Recently, magnetic reconnection during collisionless, stressed, X-point collapse was studied using kinetic, 2.5-dimensional, fully electromagnetic, relativistic particle-in-cell numerical code [D. Tsiklauri and T. Haruki, Phys. Plasmas 14, 112905 (2007)]. Here we finalize the investigation of this topic by addressing key outstanding physical questions: (i) Which term in the generalized Ohm's law is responsible for the generation of the reconnection electric field? (ii) How does the time evolution of the reconnected flux vary with the ion-electron mass ratio? (iii) What is the exact energy budget of the reconnection process; i.e., in which proportion initial (mostly magnetic) energy is converted into other forms of energy? (iv) Are there any anisotropies in the velocity distribution of the accelerated particles? The following points have been established. (i) A reconnection electric field is generated by the electron pressure tensor off-diagonal terms, resembling to the case of tearing unstable Harris current sheet studied by the GEM reconnection challenge. (ii) For m{sub i}/m{sub e}>>1, the time evolution of the reconnected flux is independent of ion-electron mass ratio. In addition, in the case of m{sub i}/m{sub e}=1, we show that reconnection proceeds slowly as the Hall term is zero; when m{sub i}/m{sub e}>>1 (i.e., the Hall term is nonzero) reconnection is fast and we conjecture that this is due to magnetic field being frozen into electron fluid, which moves significantly faster than ion fluid. (iii) Within one Alfven time, somewhat less than half ({approx}40%) of the initial total (roughly magnetic) energy is converted into the kinetic energy of electrons, and somewhat more than half ({approx}60%) into kinetic energy of ions (similar to solar flare observations). (iv) In the strongly stressed X-point case, in about one Alfven time, a full isotropy in all three spatial directions of the velocity distribution is seen for superthermal electrons (also commensurate with solar flare observations)
- OSTI ID:
- 21254552
- Journal Information:
- Physics of Plasmas, Vol. 15, Issue 10; Other Information: DOI: 10.1063/1.2999532; (c) 2008 American Institute of Physics; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 1070-664X
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
Similar Records
The effect of guide-field and boundary conditions on collisionless magnetic reconnection in a stressed X-point collapse
Magnetic reconnection during collisionless, stressed, X-point collapse using particle-in-cell simulation