Dissipation and Reconnection in Current Sheets in Turbulence of a Coronal Loop Model

Minping Wan, University of Delaware, Newark, United States, Antonio F Rappazzo, UCLA, Earth, Planetary and Space Sciences, Pasadena, CA, United States, Prof. William H Matthaeus, University of Delaware, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Newark, DE, United States, Sergio Servidio, Universita' della Calabria, Rende, Italy and Sean Oughton, University of Waikato, Department of Mathematics, Hamilton, New Zealand
Abstract:
Turbulence and magnetic reconnection are two fundamental processes
that are critical for many laboratory, space, and astrophysical
phenomena. Here we study the statistics of coherent current sheets,
the population of X-type critical points, and reconnection rates
in a coronal loop geometry, via numerical simulations of
Reduced magnetohydrodynamic (RMHD) turbulence, a familiar weakly
three dimensional model of MHD. Current sheets and
sites of reconnection (magnetic X-points) are identified
in two-dimensional (2D) planes of the three-dimensional (3D)
simulation domain. The geometry of the identified current sheets,
including area, length, and width, and the magnetic dissipation
occurring in the current sheets are statistically characterized.
We also examine the role of magnetic reconnection, by computing
the reconnection rates at the identified X-points and investigating
their association with current sheets.
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