INTRODUCTION


  • Rearrangement of the photospheric magnetic fields is a necessary condition for solar flares

  • Fast magnetic reconnection in the corona is principal mechanism to release energy

  • Possibility of fast reconnection in the photosphere?
    • Photospheric reconnection as a source for prominence plasma
      (Litvinenko 1999)
    • X-ray bright points (Priest et al. 1994)
    • Chromospheric heating via photospheric reconnection?
      (Aschwanden et al. 2000)

  • How much we know about the photospheric reconnection?
    • Reconnection Rate - VA/n, where 1 < n < 103!
    • Model for the photospheric reconnection - Sweet-Parker reconnection?

©BBSO/NJIT Seminar on OCT 99, 2000