Inertial-Range Reconnection in Magnetohydrodynamic Turbulence and in the Solar Wind
Plasma Physics
2015-09-29 v1 Solar and Stellar Astrophysics
Fluid Dynamics
Space Physics
Abstract
In situ spacecraft data on the solar wind show events identified as magnetic reconnection with outflows and apparent "`-lines" times ion scales. To understand the role of turbulence at these scales, we make a case study of an inertial-range reconnection event in a magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulation. We observe stochastic wandering of field-lines in space, breakdown of standard magnetic flux-freezing due to Richardson dispersion, and a broadened reconnection zone containing many current sheets. The coarse-grain magnetic geometry is like large-scale reconnection in the solar wind, however, with a hyperbolic flux-tube or "-line" extending over integral length-scales.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1503.00509,
title = {Inertial-Range Reconnection in Magnetohydrodynamic Turbulence and in the Solar Wind},
author = {Cristian C. Lalescu and Yi-Kang Shi and Gregory L. Eyink and Theodore D. Drivas and Ethan T. Vishniac and Alexander Lazarian},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1503.00509},
year = {2015}
}