April 8, 2011, 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm

April 8, 2011, 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm

Inflow Density Influence on Magnetotail Reconnection and Dipolarization

Dr. Penny Wu, University of Delaware

In the Earth magnetotail, it is postulated that the lobe density could be 2 orders of magnitude less than the plasma sheet density [e.g.,Haaland2009]. Although, it is hard to directly measure the lobe density due to instrument limitations. Indirect reconnection signatures such as the dipolarization front (DF) [Runov2009, Sitnov2009] can be measured with satellite observations. We study the effect of varying inflow densities to the dynamics of magnetic reconnection with a particle-in-cell (PIC) code, with not only the objective of searching for practical implications for lobe density but also the goal to understanding fundamental reconnection physics. We found that small inflow density dramatically increase the reconnection rate and effect the diffusion region physical processes, and that the DF plays an important role in ion heating and reconnection dissipation via ion reflection.