HR: 08:00h
AN: SM11B-01 INVITED     [Abstracts]
TI: Recent developments in the modeling of magnetic reconnection in the local cosmos
AU: * Drake, J F
EM: drake@plasma.umd.edu
AF: University of Maryland, IREAP University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742 United States
AB: The release of energy during magnetic reconnection drives solar flares, substorms in the Earth's magnetosphere and disruptions in laboratory fusion experiments. The complexity of the processes that facilitate the breaking of magnetic field lines, drive the high speed flows and produce energetic particles have made understanding reconnection a challenge. Computational models of reconnection and associated theoretical insight are playing a key role in identifying key physical processes that can be checked with satellite and laboratory experiments and in designing the instrumentation required for satellite missions. I will discuss critical scientific issues that are being addressed by modelers. Do the Hall currents that have been measured in the magnetosphere and in laboratory experiments also control reconnection in the solar atmosphere and astrophysics? Do laminar or turbulent processes break the frozen-in condition, e.g., is anomalous resistivity important or not? How does an ambient guide field impact reconnection? Under what conditions is reconnection steady? Bursty? How does reconnection produce the energetic particles measured in magnetospheric and solar events? Synthesizing the data from the broad range of observations from the laboratory to the solar atmosphere into testable models is playing a critical role in answering these universal questions.
DE: 2723 Magnetic reconnection (7526, 7835)
DE: 7526 Magnetic reconnection (2723, 7835)
DE: 7835 Magnetic reconnection (2723, 7526)
DE: 7845 Particle acceleration
SC: SPA-Magnetospheric Physics [SM]
MN: Fall Meeting 2005