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arXiv · 0907.0794

Collisionless Magnetic Reconnection via Alfven Eigenmodes

Lei Dai
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Abstract

We propose an analytic approach to the problem of collisionless magnetic reconnection formulated as a process of Alfven eigenmodes' generation and dissipation. Alfven eigenmodes are confined by the current sheet in the same way that quantum mechanical waves are confined by the tanh^2 potential. The dynamical time scale of reconnection is the system scale divided by the eigenvalue propagation velocity of the n=1 mode. The prediction of the n=1 mode shows good agreement with the in situ measurement of the reconnection-associated Hall fields.

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Lei Dai. 2009-07-04. Collisionless Magnetic Reconnection via Alfven Eigenmodes. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.102.245003

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