New Insights on the High Reconnection Rate and the Diminishment of Ion Outflow

Fuente: arXiv
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Auteurs principaux: Fan, Cheng-Yu, Wang, Shan, Zhou, Xu-Zhi, Lu, San, Lu, Quanming, Pyakurel, Prayash Sharma, Zong, Qiugang, Liu, Zhi-Yang
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2024
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author Fan, Cheng-Yu
Wang, Shan
Zhou, Xu-Zhi
Lu, San
Lu, Quanming
Pyakurel, Prayash Sharma
Zong, Qiugang
Liu, Zhi-Yang
author_facet Fan, Cheng-Yu
Wang, Shan
Zhou, Xu-Zhi
Lu, San
Lu, Quanming
Pyakurel, Prayash Sharma
Zong, Qiugang
Liu, Zhi-Yang
contents The recently discovered electron-only reconnection has drawn great interests due to abnormal features like lack of ion outflows and high reconnection rates. Using particle-in-cell simulations, we investigate their physical mechanisms. The reconnection rate, when normalized by ion parameters ($R_i$), may appear anomalously high, whereas that normalized by electron parameters ($R_e$) remains ~0.1. We propose that the essence of high $R_i$ is insufficient field line bending outside the electron diffusion region, indicating an incomplete development of the ion diffusion region. It may result from bursty reconnection in thin current sheets, or small system sizes. The ion outflow diminishes at high $β_i$ when the gyroradius ($ρ_i$) exceeds the system size. Low-velocity ions still experience notable acceleration from Hall fields. However, a local distribution includes many high-velocity ions that experience random accelerations from different electric fields across $ρ_i$, resulting in near-zero bulk velocities. Our study helps understand reconnection structures and the underlying physics for transitions between different regimes.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2411_13352
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle New Insights on the High Reconnection Rate and the Diminishment of Ion Outflow
Fan, Cheng-Yu
Wang, Shan
Zhou, Xu-Zhi
Lu, San
Lu, Quanming
Pyakurel, Prayash Sharma
Zong, Qiugang
Liu, Zhi-Yang
Plasma Physics
Space Physics
The recently discovered electron-only reconnection has drawn great interests due to abnormal features like lack of ion outflows and high reconnection rates. Using particle-in-cell simulations, we investigate their physical mechanisms. The reconnection rate, when normalized by ion parameters ($R_i$), may appear anomalously high, whereas that normalized by electron parameters ($R_e$) remains ~0.1. We propose that the essence of high $R_i$ is insufficient field line bending outside the electron diffusion region, indicating an incomplete development of the ion diffusion region. It may result from bursty reconnection in thin current sheets, or small system sizes. The ion outflow diminishes at high $β_i$ when the gyroradius ($ρ_i$) exceeds the system size. Low-velocity ions still experience notable acceleration from Hall fields. However, a local distribution includes many high-velocity ions that experience random accelerations from different electric fields across $ρ_i$, resulting in near-zero bulk velocities. Our study helps understand reconnection structures and the underlying physics for transitions between different regimes.
title New Insights on the High Reconnection Rate and the Diminishment of Ion Outflow
topic Plasma Physics
Space Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2411.13352