From Solar and Stellar Flares to Coronal Heating: Theory and Observations of How Magnetic Reconnection Regulates Coronal Conditions

Abstract

There is currently no explanation of why the corona has the temperature and density it has. We present a model which explains how the dynamics of magnetic reconnection regulates the conditions in the corona. A bifurcation in magnetic reconnection at a critical state enforces an upper bound on the coronal temperature for a given density. We present observational evidence from 107 flares in 37 sun-like stars that stellar coronae are near this critical state. The model may be important to self-organized criticality models of the solar corona.

arXiv comment13 pages, 2 figures, accepted to Ap. J. Lett., February 2008

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• Magnetic Reconnection in Extreme Astrophysical Environments
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• Plasmoid Instability in High-Lundquist-Number Magnetic Reconnection
• Comparison of secondary islands in collisional reconnection to Hall reconnection
• Statistical Description of a Magnetized Corona above a Turbulent Accretion Disk
• Reconnection in Marginally Collisionless Accretion Disk Coronae
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• Long-Period Intensity Pulsations in Coronal Loops Explained by Thermal Non-Equilibrium Cycles
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• Corona and XUV emission modelling of the Sun and Sun-like stars
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• Self-Organization of Reconnecting Plasmas to Marginal Collisionality in the Solar Corona
• Combining particle acceleration and coronal heating via data-constrained calculations of nanoflares in coronal loops
• A new fast reconnection model in a collisionless regime
• Phase Diagrams of Forced Magnetic Reconnection in Taylor's Model
• Discovery of the subsecond linearly polarized spikes of synchrotron origin in the UV Ceti giant optical flare
• On the role of system size in Hall MHD magnetic reconnection
• Estimates of Densities and Filling Factors from a Cooling Time Analysis of Solar Microflares Observed with RHESSI