Dissipation in Relativistic Pair-Plasma Reconnection

Abstract

We present an investigation of the relativistic dissipation in magnetic reconnection. The investigated system consists of an electron-positron plasma. A relativistic generalization of Ohm's law is derived. We analyze a set of numerical simulations, composed of runs with and without guide magnetic field, and of runs with different species temperatures. The calculations indicate that the thermal inertia-based dissipation process survives in relativistic plasmas. For anti-parallel reconnection, it is found that the pressure tensor divergence remains the sole contributor to the reconnection electric field, whereas relativistic guide field reconnection exhibits a similarly important role of the bulk inertia terms.