Subash Adhikari

Postdoctoral Researcher

Reconnection from a turbulence perspective


Journal article


Subash Adhikari, Michael A. Shay, Tulasi N. Parashar, Prayash Sharma Pyakurel, William H. Matthaeus, Daniel Godzieba, Julia E. Stawarz, Jonathan P. Eastwood, Joel T. Dahlin
Physics of Plasmas, vol. 27(042305), 2020


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APA   Click to copy
Adhikari, S., Shay, M. A., Parashar, T. N., Pyakurel, P. S., Matthaeus, W. H., Godzieba, D., … Dahlin, J. T. (2020). Reconnection from a turbulence perspective. Physics of Plasmas, 27(042305). https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5128376


Chicago/Turabian   Click to copy
Adhikari, Subash, Michael A. Shay, Tulasi N. Parashar, Prayash Sharma Pyakurel, William H. Matthaeus, Daniel Godzieba, Julia E. Stawarz, Jonathan P. Eastwood, and Joel T. Dahlin. “Reconnection from a Turbulence Perspective.” Physics of Plasmas 27, no. 042305 (2020).


MLA   Click to copy
Adhikari, Subash, et al. “Reconnection from a Turbulence Perspective.” Physics of Plasmas, vol. 27, no. 042305, 2020, doi:10.1063/1.5128376.


BibTeX   Click to copy

@article{subash2020a,
  title = {Reconnection from a turbulence perspective},
  year = {2020},
  issue = {042305},
  journal = {Physics of Plasmas},
  volume = {27},
  doi = {10.1063/1.5128376},
  author = {Adhikari, Subash and Shay, Michael A. and Parashar, Tulasi N. and Pyakurel, Prayash Sharma and Matthaeus, William H. and Godzieba, Daniel and Stawarz, Julia E. and Eastwood, Jonathan P. and Dahlin, Joel T.}
}

Abstract

The spectral properties associated with laminar, anti-parallel reconnection are examined using a 2.5D kinetic particle in cell simulation. Both the reconnection rate and the energy spectrum exhibit three distinct phases: an initiation phase where the reconnection rate grows, a quasi-steady phase, and a declining phase where both the reconnection rate and the energy spectrum decrease. During the steady phase, the energy spectrum exhibits approximately a double power law behavior, with a slope near −5/3 at wave numbers smaller than the inverse ion inertial length and a slope steeper than −8/3 for larger wave numbers up to the inverse electron inertial length. This behavior is consistent with a Kolmogorov energy cascade and implies that laminar reconnection may fundamentally be an energy cascade process. Consistent with this idea is the fact that the reconnection rate exhibits a rough correlation with the energy spectrum at wave numbers near the inverse ion inertial length. The 2D spectrum is strongly anisotropic with most energy associated with the wave vector direction normal to the current sheet. Reconnection acts to isotropize the energy spectrum, reducing the Shebalin angle from an initial value of 70° to about 48° (nearly isotropic) by the end of the simulation. The distribution of energy over length scales is further analyzed by dividing the domain into spatial subregions and employing structure functions.