Relativistic Particle Acceleration in a Folded Current Sheet
Astrophysics
2009-11-10 v2
Abstract
Two-dimensional particle simulations of a relativistic Harris current sheet of pair plasmashave demonstrated that the system is unstable to the relativistic drift kink instability (RDKI) and that a new kind of acceleration process takes place in the deformed current sheet. This process contributes to the generation of non-thermal particles and contributes to the fast magnetic dissipation in the current sheet structure. The acceleration mechanism and a brief comparison with relativistic magnetic reconnection are presented.
Cite
@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0411373,
title = {Relativistic Particle Acceleration in a Folded Current Sheet},
author = {S. Zenitani and M. Hoshino},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0411373},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
11 preprint pages, including 3 .eps figures