Abstract The driven collisionless magnetic reconnection processes at the dayside magnetopause and in the magnetotail are investigated through 2 1 2 -dimensional particle simulations. During reconnection, magnetic field configurations with both a single X line and multiple X lines are obtained. Magnetic reconnection enhancements, which are indicated by the peaks in the inductive electric field, are observed in the simulations. Coincident with the magnetic reconnection enhancements, bursts of energetic particles, electrons with an energy spectrum of f e(E) ∼ E −3.8 and ions with an energy spectrum of f i(E) ∼ E −4.4, are generated during the reconnection processes. Field-aligned particle heat fluxes are also generated. Intense plasma waves associated with the reconnection processes are observed. It is found that the fluctuating magnetic field has a power spectrum of P B ∼ f −3.8 and the fluctuating electric field has a power spectrum of P E ∼ f −1.8, respectively. In addition, the characteristics of slow shocks associated with the magnetic reconnection process in the magnetotail are also studied with 1-dimensional hybrid simulations. In this paper, a review of our simulation studies of driven collisionless magnetic reconnection and slow shocks in the magnetospheric current sheets is presented.


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    Title :

    Particle simulations of collisionless magnetic reconnection in magnetospheric current sheets


    Contributors:
    Ding, D.Q. (author) / Lee, L.C. (author)

    Published in:

    Advances in Space Research ; 11 , 9 ; 117-127


    Publication date :

    1991-01-01


    Size :

    11 pages




    Type of media :

    Article (Journal)


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English