HR: 10:20h
AN: SH42B-01 INVITED    [Abstracts]
TI: Magnetic Reconnection in the Solar Wind: Recent Results
AU: * Gosling, J T
EM: jack.gosling@lasp.colorado.edu
AF: Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, University of Colorado, 1234 Innovation Drive, Boulder, CO 80303, United States
AB: Magnetic reconnection occurs frequently at thin current sheets in the solar wind and produces exhausts of jetting plasma bounded by back-to-back rotational discontinuities. The exhausts are identified as roughly Alfvenic accelerated plasma confined to field reversal regions that almost always take the form of bifurcated (double-step) current sheets. The exhausts are embedded within the solar wind flow and are convected past a spacecraft on time scales ranging from seconds up to several hours, with time scales less than 100 s being dominant. Near solar minimum reconnection exhausts are swept past Earth at a rate of 40 to 70 events/month, with numerous events being associated with local magnetic field shear angles considerably less than 90 degrees. The exhausts are observed predominantly in the low-speed solar wind or in association with interplanetary coronal mass ejections in plasma predominantly having low proton beta; however, reconnection also occurs in the turbulent, high-speed wind from coronal holes, but less frequently. Multi-spacecraft observations demonstrate that the exhausts often result from prolonged (hours) reconnection at extended (up to at least 4.3 x 10⁶ km) and continuous X-lines.
DE: 2723 Magnetic reconnection (7526, 7835)
DE: 7513 Coronal mass ejections (2101)
DE: 7519 Flares
DE: 7831 Laboratory studies and experimental techniques
DE: 7835 Magnetic reconnection (2723, 7526)
SC: SPA-Solar and Heliospheric Physics [SH]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting