HR: 0830h
AN: SH31A-1076    [PDF]
TI: 3D Kinetic Simulations of the Onset of Collisionless Magnetic Reconnection
AU: * Ricci, P
EM: ricci@lanl.gov
AF: INFM and Dipartimento di Energetica, Politecnico di Torino Corso Duca degli Abruzzi 24, Torino, 10129 Italy
AU: Brackbill, J U
EM: brackbill@cybermesa.com
AF: Mathematics and Statistics, University of New Mexico, MSC03 2150, Albuquerque, NM 87131 United States
AU: Daughton, W S
EM: daughton@lanl.gov
AF: LANL, MS B219, Los Alamos, NM 87545 United States
AU: Lapenta, G
EM: lapenta@lanl.gov
AF: LANL, MS K717, Los Alamos, NM 87544 United States
AB: We study the onset of collisionless magnetic reconnection by performing kinetic simulations of Harris current sheets. Simulations of two-dimensional systems show that the saturation level of the tearing mode is very low if no initial perturbation is added. Two-dimensional simulations in the current aligned plane show the development of the fastest lower-hybrid drift instabilities on the electron gyroscale, followed by electromagnetic modes with wavelengths intermediate between the ion and the electron gyroscale and, finally, the velocity shear (non-linear consequence of the lower-hybrid modes) triggers a flapping mode that kinks the current sheet. Finally, we perform three-dimensional simulations to investigate the effect of the current aligned modes on the onset of the reconnection process. The simulations are performed with CELESTE3D, an implicit PIC suitable for large scale and high mass ratio simulations, and with a massively parallel explicit PIC code able to study in more detail the microphysical processes.
DE: 2744 Magnetotail
DE: 2788 Storms and substorms
DE: 7835 Magnetic reconnection
DE: 7843 Numerical simulation studies
DE: 7871 Waves and instabilities
SC: SPA - Solar and Heliospheric Physics [SH]
MN: 2003 Fall Meeting