A Model for the Origin of High Density in Loop-top X-ray Sources

Super-hot looptop sources, detected in some large solar flares, are compact sources of HXR emission with spectra matching thermal electron populations exceeding 30 megakelvins. High observed emission measure, as well as inference of electron thermalization within the small source region, both provide evidence of high densities at the looptop; typically more than an order of magnitude above ambient. Where some investigators have suggested such density enhancement results from a rapid enhancement in the magnetic field strength, we propose an alternative model, based on Petschek reconnection, whereby looptop plasma is heated and compressed by slow magnetosonic shocks generated self-consistently through flux retraction following reconnection. Under steady conditions such shocks can enhance density by no more than a factor of four. These steady shock relations (Rankine-Hugoniot relations) turn out to be inapplicable to Petschek's model owing to transient effects of thermal conduction. The actual density enhancement can in fact exceed a factor of ten over the entire reconnection outflow. An ensemble of flux tubes retracting following reconnection at an ensemble of distinct sites will have a collective emission measure proportional to the rate of flux tube production. This rate, distinct from the local reconnection rate within a single tube, can be measured separately through flare ribbon motion. Typical flux transfer rates and loop parameters yield emission measures comparable to those observed in super-hot sources.