Abstract
Magnetic field annihilation in resistive viscous incompressible plasmas is analyzed. Anisotropic viscous transport is modeled by the dominant terms in the Braginskii viscous stress tensor. An analytical solution for steady-state magnetic merging, driven by vortical plasma flows in two dimensions, is derived. Resistive and viscous energy dissipation rates are calculated. It is shown that, except in the limiting case of zero vorticity, viscous heating can significantly exceed Joule heating at the merging site. The results strongly suggest that viscous dissipation can provide a significant fraction of the total energy release in solar flares, which may have far-reaching implications for flare models.
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