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Session Proposal: Physics of Current Sheets in Planetary Magnetospheres and Solar Wind: Plasma Kinetics, Magnetic Reconnection, and Particle Acceleration (AGU25)

SM023
Physics of Current Sheets in Planetary Magnetospheres and Solar Wind: Plasma Kinetics, Magnetic Reconnection, and Particle Acceleration

Session ID#: 251901

Session Description:
Current sheets (CSs) represent fundamental boundaries separating regions with distinct magnetic fields and plasma properties. As primary sites for magnetic reconnection, energy dissipation, and particle acceleration, they play crucial roles across space plasma environments. In the solar wind, CSs function as essential building blocks of turbulence and contribute significantly to plasma heating. At planetary magnetopauses, magnetic reconnection within CSs facilitates solar wind entry into magnetospheres and drives magnetospheric dynamics. Similarly, reconnection in magnetotail CSs powers geomagnetic storms and regulates energetic particle acceleration and transport. CS stability and evolution are predominantly determined by their configurations, which vary significantly among solar wind, magnetopause, and magnetotail environments. Recent missions provide unprecedented observational constraints on CS configurations, presenting both challenges and opportunities for theoretical models and simulations. This session integrates theory, simulations, and observations to enhance understanding of how CS configurations influence reconnection initiation, dynamics, and particle acceleration across different space plasma environments.
Co-Sponsor(s):
  • SH - SPA-Solar and Heliospheric Physics
Index Terms:

2724 Magnetopause and boundary layers [MAGNETOSPHERIC PHYSICS]
2744 Magnetotail [MAGNETOSPHERIC PHYSICS]
7526 Magnetic reconnection [SOLAR PHYSICS, ASTROPHYSICS, AND ASTRONOMY]
7811 Discontinuities [SPACE PLASMA PHYSICS]
Primary Convener:  Xin An, University of California Los Angeles, Earth, Planetary and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, United States
Conveners:  Anna Tenerani, The University of Texas at Austin, Department of Physics, Austin, United States, Anthony Sciola, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, United States and Ivan Vasko, University of Texas at Dallas, Department of Physics, Richardson, TX, United States
Student/Early Career Convener:  Sergei Kamaletdinov, University of California Los Angeles, Department of Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, United States
 
Thin Current Sheet Formation in the Magnetotail: a Global-scale Kinetic Process (Invited) (1853912)
Andrei Runov, University of California Los Angeles, Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, CA, United States
 
Substorm Magnetotail Dynamics at Low Altitudes: Insights from ELFIN and CIRBE Observations with RCM Simulations (1860208)
Weiqin Sun1, Xiaojia Zhang2, Anton Artemyev3, Rumi Nakamura4, XI LU5, Xinlin Li6, Yang Mei6, Zheng Xiang7, Declan O'Brien6 and Vassilis Angelopoulos8, (1)University of Texas at Dallas, Physics, Richardson, TX, United States, (2)University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, United States, (3)University of California Los Angeles, Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, United States, (4)Austrian Academy of Sciences, Space Research Institute, Graz, Austria, (5)University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, TX, United States, (6)University of Colorado Boulder, Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics and Dept of Aerospace Engineering Sciences, Boulder, United States, (7)University of Colorado Boulder, Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, Boulder, United States, (8)University of California Los Angeles, Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, CA, United States
 
Role of Earth’s magnetotail current sheet in radiation belt losses (1860329)
Anton Artemyev1, Vassilis Angelopoulos2, Xiao-jia Zhang3, Jacob Bortnik4, Yoshizumi Miyoshi5, Colin Wilkins6, Satoshi Kasahara7, Tomoaki Hori8, Ayako Matsuoka9, Takefumi Mitani10, Takeshi Takashima7, Mariko Teramoto11, Kazuhiro Yamamoto12 and Iku Shinohara13, (1)University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, United States, (2)University of California Los Angeles, Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, CA, United States, (3)University of Texas at Dallas, Department of Physics, Richardson, United States, (4)University of California Los Angeles, Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, Los Angeles, United States, (5)Nagoya University, Institute for Space-Earth Environmental Research, Nagoya, Japan, (6)University of California Los Angeles, Department of Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, United States, (7)ISAS, JAXA, Sagamihara, Japan, (8)ISEE, Nagoya University, Nagoya, Japan, (9)Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan, (10)Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, Institute of Space and Astronautical Science, Sagamihara, Japan, (11)Nagoya University, ISEE, Nagoya, Japan, (12)University of Tokyo, Graduate School of Science, Tokyo, Japan, (13)Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, Institute of Space and Astronautical Science, Sagamihara, Kanagawa, Japan
 
Ion Interactions with Polarized Current Sheets (1868775)
David Tonoian, University of Texas at Dallas, Physics, Richardson, TX, United States, Xiao-jia Zhang, University of Texas at Dallas, Department of Physics, Richardson, United States and Anton Artemyev, University of California Los Angeles, Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, United States
 
Alfvén Eigenmodes in Harris Current Sheet (1885882)
Xin An, University of California Los Angeles, Earth, Planetary and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, United States, Yi-Hsin Liu, Dartmouth College, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Hanover, NH, United States, Anton Artemyev, University of California Los Angeles, Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, United States, Vassilis Angelopoulos, University of California Los Angeles, Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, CA, United States and Viktor A. Frantsuzov, National Research University Higher School of Economics, Faculty of Physics, Moscow, Russia
 
Do Mercury's Dipolarization Fronts Originate From Flux Ropes? MHD-AEPIC Simulations of Mercury's Magnetosphere (1905537)
Alexander Cushen, University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Department of Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering, Ann Arbor, MI, United States, Xianzhe Jia, University of Michigan, Department of Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering, Ann Arbor, United States, James A Slavin, University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Department of Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering, Ann Arbor, United States, Weijie Sun, University of California Berkeley, Space Science Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, United States, Gabor Toth, University of Michigan, Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering, Ann Arbor, United States and Yuxi Chen, University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Ann Arbor, United States
 
Energetic particle scattering by thin current sheets in solar wind: determination of transport coefficients (1906959)
Zijin Zhang, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, United States, Anton Artemyev, University of California Los Angeles, Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, United States and Vassilis Angelopoulos, University of California Los Angeles, Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, Los Angeles, CA, United States
 
Reconnection Onset in the Magnetotail: Overstretching, Plasma Watersheds, External Driving and Buoyancy Effects (1911177)
Mikhail I. Sitnov, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, MD, United States and Harry Arnold, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, United States
 
The Cause of Non-Gyrotropic Distribution Functions in Compressed Magnetotail Current Sheets (1916903)
Ami M DuBois1, Chris E Crabtree1, Emily Rose Lichko2 and Gurudas Ganguli1, (1)US Naval Research Laboratory, Plasma Physics Division, Washington, DC, United States, (2)US Naval Research Laboratory, Plasma Physics, Washington, United States
 
Scalable Machine-Learning Detection of Magnetospheric Reconnection Events via Physics-Constrained Synthetic Datasets (1916991)
Deep Ghuge1, Vadim Uritsky1,2 and Daniel J Gershman2, (1)Catholic University of America, Washington, United States, (2)NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, United States
 
Spectral Features of Magnetic Fluctuations from Inertial to Kinetic Scales in Mercury’s Magnetotail Current Sheet (1970745)
Xinmin Li1, Chuanfei Dong1, Liang Wang1, Sae Aizawa2, Lina Hadid3, James A Slavin4, Hongyang Zhou1 and Chi Zhang5, (1)Boston University, Boston, United States, (2)LPP, Ecole Polytechnique, Sorbonne Université, CNRS, Jussieu, Paris, France, (3)CNRS-LPP, Paris, France, (4)University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Department of Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering, Ann Arbor, United States, (5)Dalian University of Technology, School of Hydraulic Engineering, Dalian, China
 
Energized Oxygen in the Magnetotail: Current Sheet Bifurcation From Speiser Motion (1996195)
Don E George and Jörg-Micha Jahn, Southwest Research Institute, San Antonio, TX, United States
 
A Self-Regulating Feedback Mechanism Between Ring Current Pressure and Magnetic Field Geometry Driven by Field Line Curvature Scattering (1997156)
Suk-Bin Kang, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Heliophysics Division, Greenbelt, MD, United States, Alex Glocer, NASA/GSFC, Greenbelt, United States, Mei-Ching Hannah Fok, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, United States, Cristian Ferradas, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, United States, Natalia Buzulukova, University of Maryland College Park, Astronomy Department, College Park, MD, United States and Gonzalo Cucho-Padin, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Urbana, United States
 
Kinetic-scale current sheets in pristine solar wind: multi-spacecraft analysis and assessment of single-spacecraft techniques (1998093)
Rachel Wang, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, United States, Ivan Vasko, University of Texas at Dallas, Department of Physics, Richardson, TX, United States, Tai Phan, University of California, Berkeley, United States and Forrest Mozer, University of California, Berkeley, Space Sciences Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, United States
See more of: SPA-Magnetospheric Physics
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