818 Influence of collisions on suprathermal elctrons in tearing instability

In many astro- and spacephysical phenomena energy conversion by magnetic reconnection is thought to be a promising candidate for the (pre)-acceleration of highly energetic particles. In most astrophysical contexts we encounter collisionless plasmas, but there are regions (e.g. the lower solar atmosphere [1]) where collisions do play a role, therefore their effect on the energy conversion processes need to be included in the study of magnetic reconnection. Based on other studies in the relativistic and collisionless regime, we investigate the particle acceleration to suprathermal energies in the (semi-) collisional regime. The 2D simulations are conducted using the OSIRIS framework starting from a double relativistic Harris sheet configuration. The parameter variations of the background temperature and the cold magnetization performed by Guo et al. [2] in the collisionless regime were reproduced and promising results for a smaller system size in the (semi-) collisional regime were obtained. In the fully collisional regime the collisions inhibit the formation of a suprathermal tail and the distribution function stays Maxwellian-like. Additionally, the distribution function becomes more skewed when conducting simulations with lower collisionality. Finally, the results from collisionless simulations could be reproduced in collisional simulations with low collisionalities.