Self-consistent modelling of nanoflares: generation of heating and thermodynamic response in 3D MHD

Resolving thermodynamic transport in three-dimensional models of stratified coronal loops is a long-standing challenge that limits progress in solving the coronal heating problem.
Since three-dimensional thermal conduction in MHD has been computationally too expensive to resolve the steep temperature gradients in the transition region, two simpler approaches have been adopted: one-dimensional, field-aligned models following the thermal response to imposed forms of heating, and three-dimensional MHD models that produce the forms of Ohmic and viscous heating self-consistently but cannot consider the consequent thermodynamic response.
Now, using a novel numerical technique, TRAC, we can resolve energetic transport in the transition region in fully three-dimensional MHD models.
In a model of a multi-stranded coronal loop in a curved arcade, we investigate the heating produced in an 'avalanche'-like process.
In such, a chain reaction of reconnection-induced local events occurs, with each event disturbing wider plasma and triggering other processes, such as shocks, jets, and turbulence, that generate heating, which we analyse with particular attention to the spatio-temporal distribution of nanoflares.
At the same time, we treat the thermodynamic response of the plasma self-consistently, and study the evolving temperature profiles.
Avalanches successfully propagate in curved arcades and appear capable of maintaining a hot corona with realistic temperatures and densities in heated loops.
One novelty of interest lies in `campfire'-like events, with simultaneous reconnection events at disjoint sites along coronal strands, akin to recent results from Solar Orbiter.