Magnetic field re-arrangement after prominence eruption

It has long been known that magnetic reconnection plays a fundamental role in a variety of solar events. Although mainly invoked in flare problems, large-scale loops interconnecting active regions, evolving coronal hole boundaries, the solar magnetic cycle itself, provide different evidence of phenomena which involve magnetic reconnection. A further example might be given by the magnetic field rearrangement which occurs after the eruption of a prominence. Since most often a prominence reforms after its disappearance and may be observed at about the same position it occupied before erupting, the magnetic field has to undergo a temporary disruption to relax back, via reconnection, to a configuration similar to the previous one. The above sequence of events is best observable in the case of two-ribbon (2-R) flares but most probably is associated with all filament eruptions. Even if the explanation of the magnetic field rearrangement after 2-R flares in terms of reconnection is generally accepted, the lack of a three-dimensional model capable of describing the field reconfiguration, has prevented, up to now, a thorough analysis of its topology as traced by Hα/x-ray loops. The purpose of the present work is to present a numerical technique which enables one to predict and visualize the reconnected configuration, at any time t, and therefore allows one to make a significant comparison of observations and model predictions throughout the whole process. 5 refs., 3 figs