Speaker
Dr
Maria Elena Innocenti
(Center for mathematical Plasma Astrophysics, Department of Mathematics, K.U. Leuven (University of Leuven), Celestijnenlaan 200B, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium)
Description
Magnetic reconnection is an intrinsically multi-scale phenomenon. At least at a first approximation,
it is possible to pinpoint areas where processes occur at different spatial and temporal scales, such
as the inflow region, the Ion Diffusion Region and the Electron Diffusion Region (EDR).
This can be used to lower the computational cost of Particle In Cell, realistic mass ratio
reconnection simulations, which are notoriously computationally expensive. We present here the
recently developed Multi-Level Multi-Domain method. It allows to reduce the computational cost of
reconnection simulations by simulating with electron scale resolution only the EDR and the
immediately surrounding areas, while the rest of the domain is simulated with ion scale resolution.
The method is demonstrated in Beck et al., 2014, and Innocenti et al., 2015. In both cases,
electron scale features (the inversion layer in the Hall field (Chen et al., 2011) and the electron jets
moving out of the EDR at electron Alfv ́en speed respectively (Karimabadi et al, 2007; Shay et al,
2007; Drake et al, 2008)) are captured by the higher resolution grid only at a computational cost
dramatically lower than the one of a comparable single level simulation.
The MLMD method can also be used for turbulence simulations, where mixed grid spectra are
obtained by seamlessly joining data points from the low- and the high-resolution grid. The role of
turbulence in magnetic reconnection is clear, but still not fully explored (Lazarian et al, 1999; Che
et al, 2011). We show here 2D realistic mass ratio MLMDsimulations of turbulence generated by the
Lower Hybrid Drift Instability.
Primary authors
Dr
Arnaud Beck
(Laboratoire Leprince-Ringuet - Ecole polytechnique, CNRS-IN2P3, France)
Prof.
Giovanni Lapenta
(Center for mathematical Plasma Astrophysics, Department of Mathematics, K.U. Leuven (University of Leuven), Celestijnenlaan 200B, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium)
Dr
Maria Elena Innocenti
(Center for mathematical Plasma Astrophysics, Department of Mathematics, K.U. Leuven (University of Leuven), Celestijnenlaan 200B, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium)
Prof.
Stefano Markidis
(PDC Center for high Performance Computing, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden)
