Experimental observation of a field-aligned ion beam produced by magnetic reconnection of two flux ropes

Abstract

An ion beam field-aligned to the background guide field (B0=330 G) was observed in a reconnection experiment on the Large Plasma Device and, to the authors' knowledge, is the first experimental observation of its kind. Two kink-unstable flux ropes (L = 11 m, d = 7.6 cm) were made to collide, which allows magnetic reconnection to occur. Sub-Alfvénic ion beams with energies of up to 15 eV were then observed from measurements of the local ion energy distribution function. The beam ions do not appear to be heated. They were correlated with the collision of the ropes and appear to be energized by magnetic reconnection. The results and interpretation of the measurements are supported by three-dimensional gyrokinetic particle simulations of the merging flux ropes and electric field measurements from previous experiments [W. Gekelman et al., Astrophys. J. 853, 33 (2018)]. The mechanism behind the acceleration appears to be non-local.