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A numerical simulation of magnetic reconnection and radiative cooling in line-tied current sheetsRadiative MHD equations are used for an optically thin plasma to carry out a numerical experiment related to the formation of 'postflare' loops. The numerical experiment starts with a current sheet that is in mechanical and thermal equilibrium but is unstable to both tearing-mode and thermal-condensation instabilities. The current sheet is line-tied at one end to a photospheric-like boundary and evolves asymmetrically. The effects of thermal conduction, resistivity variation, and gravity are ignored. In general, reconnection in the nonlinear stage of the tearing-mode instability can strongly affect the onset of condensations unless the radiative-cooling time scale is much smaller than the tearing-mode time scale. When the ambient plasma is less than 0.2, the reconnection enters a regime where the outflow from the reconnection region is supermagnetosonic with respect to the fast-mode wave speed. In the supermagnetosonic regime the most rapidly condensing regions occur downstream of a fast-mode shock that forms where the outflow impinges on closed loops attached to the photospheric-like boundary. A similar shock-induced condensation might occur during the formation of 'postflare' loops.
Document ID
19920033163
Acquisition Source
Legacy CDMS
Document Type
Reprint (Version printed in journal)
External Source(s)
Authors
Forbes, T. G.
(Observatoire de Paris-Meudon France)
Malherbe, J. M.
(Paris Observatoire, Meudon, France)
Date Acquired
August 15, 2013
Publication Date
October 1, 1991
Publication Information
Publication: Solar Physics
Volume: 135
ISSN: 0038-0938
Subject Category
Solar Physics
Accession Number
92A15787
Funding Number(s)
CONTRACT_GRANT: NSF ATM-89-16303
CONTRACT_GRANT: NAG5-1479
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Other

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