Processes in current sheets responsible for fast energy conversion in the magnetospheric collisionless plasma

Abstract

Dynamics of the magnetospheric plasma configuration intrinsically features intermittent slow and fast phases. The fast transition is a nonlinear process, loss of equilibrium which ends up the slow quasi-static evolution. The process is analysed as a dynamical bifurcation. It appears when marginal stability state is reached in the course of that evolution, either for tearing mode or for ballooning mode disturbances. The resulting force imbalance leads to spontaneous formation of nonlinear kinetic thin current structures. Those are either a pair of slow collisionless shocks or a specific anisotropic thin current sheet embedded in a thicker plasma sheet structure. Both are the sites of intense energy conversion, and they implement fast magnetic reconnection in the magnetospheric collisionless plasma.