Abstract
Reconnection is an important process of structure formation in fluid dynamics. It occurs in form of vortex reconnection in hydrodynamics as well as in form of magnetic reconnection in plasmas. Two basic types of reconnection are known. The planar two-dimensional reconnection and the more generic, but more complicated three-dimensional case. These two types differ for example with respect to their production of helicity in reconnection.
Simple analytic examples of vortex reconnection are given and compared with corresponding solutions of magnetic reconnection. It is shown that, while for magnetic reconnection two-dimensional stationary solutions exist, vortex reconnection always requires a time-dependent velocity field. This explains why vortex reconnection in spite of all similarities often has a more complicated geometry than magnetic reconnection.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
De Waele, A.T.A.M. & Aarts, R.G.K.M. 1994 Route to vortex reconnection, Phys. Rev. Lett. 72, 482–485.
Hornig, G. 2001a The Geometry of Magnetic and Vortex Reconnection. In Quantized Vortex Dynamics and Superfluid Turbulence (ed. C. F. Barenghi, R. J. Donnelly & W.F. Vinen), Lecture Notes in Physics 571, Springer.
Hornig, G. 2001b The geometry of reconnection. In Geometry and Topology of Fluid Flows (ed. R. Ricca) Kluwer.
Kida, S., Takaoka, M. & Hussain, F. 1991 Collision of two vortex rings, J. Fluid Mech.230, 583–646.
Moffatt, H.K. 1978 Magnetic field generation in electric conducting fluids, Cambridge University Press.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers
About this paper
Cite this paper
Hornig, G. (2002). Reconnection in magnetic and vorticity fields. In: Bajer, K., Moffatt, H.K. (eds) Tubes, Sheets and Singularities in Fluid Dynamics. Fluid Mechanics and Its Applications, vol 71. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/0-306-48420-X_19
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/0-306-48420-X_19
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-1-4020-0980-8
Online ISBN: 978-0-306-48420-9
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive