Interchange reconnection and the 'blurring' of the Sun's open-closed-flux boundary
Abstract
We describe a new computational approach for 'segmentation' of the coronal magnetic field into distinct flux domains based on global renderings of the squashing factor Q. The boundaries of these domains constitute the S-web: the web of high Q structures thought to play an important role in the generation of the slow solar wind. We then use static models to demonstrate the consequences of interchange reconnection at the open-closed-flux boundary (OCB) in a fragmented current layer. We show that it leads to efficient mixing of magnetic flux (and therefore plasma) from open and closed field regions. This corresponds to an increase in the length and complexity of the OCB. Thus, whenever reconnection occurs at a null point or separator of this OCB, the associated separatrix arc of the S-web in the high corona becomes not a single line but a band of finite thickness within which the OCB is highly structured. This suggests that around the high-Q arcs of the S-web a structured mixture of open and previously closed-field plasma is present that could be detectable by the upcoming Parker Solar Probe mission.
- Publication:
-
Solar Heliospheric and INterplanetary Environment (SHINE 2018)
- Pub Date:
- July 2018
- Bibcode:
- 2018shin.confE..53P