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Effects of Ion-to-Electron Mass Ratio on Electron Dynamics in Collisionless Magnetic Reconnection |
GUO Jun1;LU Quan-Ming2 |
1School of Mathematics and Physics, Qingdao University of Science and Technology, Qingdao 2660412School of Earth and Space Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026 |
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Cite this article: |
GUO Jun, LU Quan-Ming 2007 Chin. Phys. Lett. 24 3199-3202 |
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Abstract A 2.5-dimensional electromagnetic particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation code is used to investigate electron behaviour in collisionless magnetic reconnection. The results show that the ion/electron mass ratio (mi/me) almost has no impact on the reconnection rate, however it can significantly affect electron behaviour in the diffusion region. For the case with larger mass ratio, the width of electron current sheet becomes smaller and the outflow region along the separatrix is smaller, hence the peak of the electron outflow speed is essentially larger. Density cavities and the parallel electric field E// along the separatrix can be found in the case with larger mass ratio, which may have significant influences on the acceleration and heating of the electrons near the X point.
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Keywords:
52.35.Vd
52.65.Rr
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Received: 21 May 2007
Published: 23 October 2007
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