Ion Acceleration During Macroscale Magnetic Reconnection

The recently developed computational model kglobal, which combines an MHD backbone with self-consistent guiding-center particles has previously demonstrated self-consistent simulations of electron acceleration during magnetic reconnection in a macroscale system that produced power-law energy spectra extending over multiple decades in energy. Here we report on an expansion of kglobal that demonstrates simultaneous ion and electron acceleration and power-law production. The ion power laws also extend over multiple decades of energy and exhibit spectral indices similar to the electrons. A strong guide field weakens the Fermi drive mechanism and suppresses nonthermal particle production. For a weak guide field, the total energy content of nonthermals dominates even though their respective number densities remain small.