The roles of fluid compression and shear in electron energization during magnetic reconnection

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that fluid compression and shear are key mechanisms for electron energization during magnetic reconnection, linking particle drift motions with fluid dynamics and informing large-scale acceleration models.

Contribution

It reveals that particle drift energization can be described by fluid compression and shear, with implications for modeling large-scale reconnection acceleration.

Findings

Compression energization dominates in weak guide field reconnection.

Shear and compression effects are comparable at 50% guide field.

Reconnection exhausts, contracting islands, and merging regions are key acceleration sites.

Abstract

Particle acceleration in space and astrophysical reconnection sites is an important unsolved problem in studies of magnetic reconnection. Earlier kinetic simulations have identified several acceleration mechanisms that are associated with particle drift motions. Here, we show that, for sufficient large systems, the energization processes due to particle drift motions can be described as fluid compression and shear, and that the shear energization is proportional to the pressure anisotropy of energetic particles. By analyzing results from fully kinetic simulations, we show that the compression energization dominates the acceleration of high-energy particles in reconnection with a weak guide field, and the compression and shear effects are comparable when the guide field is 50\% of the reconnecting component. Spatial distributions of those energization effects reveal that reconnection exhausts, contracting islands, and island merging regions are the three most important regions for compression and shear acceleration. This study connects particle energization by particle guiding-center drift motions with that due to background fluid motions, as in the energetic particle transport theory. It provides foundations for building particle transport models for large-scale reconnection acceleration such as those in solar flares.