[GTP] IMAGe-GTP Seminar---William H. Matthaeus--This Friday at 2pm

[Silvia Gentile]

MHD Relaxation, Intermittency and Reconnection: Implications for Solar 
Wind Structure and Dissipation
Professor William. H. Matthaeus
Bartol Research Institute, University of Delaware




Studies of MHD turbulence show that small scale coherent structures 
appear as a by-product of an intermittent cascade, driven by what appear 
to be essentially ideal local relaxation processes.  This view of 
generation of non-Gaussian features of turbulence is consistent with 
intermittency analysis. Furthermore the structures produced are shown to 
have statistical properties essentially identical to statistics of 
events frequently occurring in the solar wind that have usually been 
identified as classical ideal MHD discontinuities.  These small scale 
structures lie at the interface between kinetic and fluid descriptions 
of low frequency plasma behavior. The implied concentrations of electric 
current density are potential sites for turbulent driven magnetic 
reconnection. Recent results show how the reconnection rates are related 
to the turbulence properties.




January 23, 2009
Center Green Laboratory 1, Room 2126
Lecture 2:00 pm
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