Interchange reconnection in a turbulent Corona
A. F. Rappazzo, W. H. Matthaeus, D. Ruffolo, S. Servidio, M. Velli

TL;DR
This paper proposes a turbulent magnetic reconnection mechanism at open-closed coronal boundaries, explaining slow solar wind origins and continuous magnetic connectivity changes without neutral points.
Contribution
It introduces a reduced MHD model showing how turbulence induces ongoing reconnection at open-closed boundary regions, challenging traditional neutral point reconnection views.
Findings
Reconnection occurs continuously in unipolar regions without neutral points.
Boundary becomes fractal, with magnetic field lines changing connectivity.
Explains slow solar wind origin and diffusion around the heliospheric current sheet.
Abstract
Magnetic reconnection at the interface between coronal holes and loops, so-called interchange reconnection, can release the hotter, denser plasma from magnetically confined regions into the heliosphere, contributing to the formation of the highly variable slow solar wind. The interchange process is often thought to develop at the apex of streamers or pseudo-streamers, near Y and X-type neutral points, but slow streams with loop composition have been recently observed along fanlike open field lines adjacent to closed regions, far from the apex. However, coronal heating models, with magnetic field lines shuffled by convective motions, show that reconnection can occur continuously in unipolar magnetic field regions with no neutral points: photospheric motions induce a magnetohydrodynamic turbulent cascade in the coronal field that creates the necessary small scales, where a sheared…
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Taxonomy
TopicsSolar and Space Plasma Dynamics · Ionosphere and magnetosphere dynamics · Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies
