Berlin 2014 – scientific programme

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SYPA: Symposium Plasma-Astrophysik

SYPA 1: Plasma Astrophysics

SYPA 1.7: Talk

Thursday, March 20, 2014, 17:15–17:30, SPA Kapelle

Influence of the anisotropic heating and guide field on the stability and non-linear evolution of a Harris current sheet — •Patricio Muñoz, Patrick Kilian, and Jörg Büchner — Max-Planck-Institut für Sonnensystemforschung, Max-Planck-Str. 2, 37191 Katlenburg-Lindau, Germany

In this work, we investigate the influence of the anisotropic heating on the stability and evolution of collisionless current sheets. We started from an initial Harris equilibrium, considering cases under the influence of a guide magnetic field. A 2D PIC code is applied to describe the development of the tearing instability in this system, comparing growth rates with some theoretical estimations. We show that an appropriate choice of shape function and other numerical parameters are essential to avoid numerical electron heating and temperature anisotropies that can drive additional instabilities of the current sheet. Eventually, those instabilities can make the current sheet stable against the tearing mode.