Can the Parker Solar Probe Detect a CME-flare Current Sheet?

TL;DR

This paper assesses the potential for the Parker Solar Probe to detect and analyze the current sheet during solar eruptions, offering insights into magnetic reconnection physics at unprecedented proximity.

Contribution

It evaluates the likelihood of PSP traversing a CME-related current sheet and explores optimal spacecraft trajectories for such detections.

Findings

PSP can potentially traverse a CME current sheet at about 10 solar radii.

Optimal spacecraft orbits increase chances of detecting the current sheet.

Provides a framework for future in situ measurements of solar eruption structures.

Abstract

A current sheet (CS) is the central structure in the disrupting magnetic configuration during solar eruptions. More than 90\% of the free magnetic energy (the difference between the energy in the non-potential magnetic field and that in the potential one) stored in the coronal magnetic field beforehand is converted into heating and kinetic energy of the plasma, as well as accelerating charged particles, by magnetic reconnection occurring in the CS. However, the detailed physical properties and fine structures of the CS are still unknown since there is no relevant information obtained via in situ detections. The Parker Solar Probe (PSP) may provide us such information should it traverse a CS in the eruption. The perihelion of PSP's final orbit is located at about 10 solar radii from the center of the Sun, so it can observe the CS at a very close distance, or even traverses the CS, which provides us a unique opportunity to look into fine properties and structures of the CS, helping reveal the detailed physics of large-scale reconnection that was impossible before. We evaluate the probability that PSP can traverse a CS, and examine the orbit of a PSP-like spacecraft that has the highest probability to traverse a CS.