title: Thermal-inertial effects on magnetic reconnection in relativistic pair plasmas.
abstract: The magnetic reconnection process is studied in relativistic pair plasmas when the thermal and inertial properties of the magnetohydrodynamical fluid are included. We find that in both Sweet-Parker and Petschek relativistic scenarios there is an increase of the reconnection rate owing to the thermal-inertial effects, both satisfying causality. To characterize the new effects we define a thermal-inertial number which is independent of the relativistic Lundquist number, implying that reconnection can be achieved even for vanishing resistivity as a result of only thermal-inertial effects. The current model has fundamental importance for relativistic collisionless reconnection, as it constitutes the simplest way to get reconnection rates faster than those accessible with the sole resistivity.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento Energia, Politecnico di Torino, Corso Duca degli Abruzzi 24, 10129 Torino, Italy and Istituto dei Sistemi Complessi-CNR, Via dei Taurini 19, 00185 Roma, Italy.
authors.forename: Luca
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Comisso
authors.affiliation: Facultad de Ingeniería y Ciencias, Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, Santiago 7941169, Chile and Departamento de Ciencias, Facultad de Artes Liberales, Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, Santiago 7941169, Chile.
authors.forename: Felipe A
authors.initials: FA
authors.lastname: Asenjo