Effects of Global Boundary and Local Collisionality on Magnetic Reconnection in a Laboratory Plasma

[摘要] The magnetic reconnection process is studied in a wide range of operating conditions in the well-controlled Magnetic Reconnection Experiment. The reconnection rate is observed to be a function of both global (i.e., system size) and local (collisionality) plasma parameters. When only local collisionality is lowered, the current sheet is shortened while effective resistivity is enhanced, both accelerating reconnection rates. At a fixed collisionality, the current sheet length increases with system size, resulting in the reduction of the reconnection rate. These results quantitatively agree with a generalized Sweet-Parker analysis.

[发布日期] 2007-07-24

[学科分类] 原子、分子光学和等离子物理

[关键词] MAGNETIC RECONNECTION;PLASMA;BOUNDARY CONDITIONS;COLLISIONS Magnetic Reconnection