Ellerman bombs, Type II white-light flares and magnetic reconnection in the solar lower atmosphere

Ellerman bombs and Type II white-light flares share many common features de spite the large energy gap between them. Both are considered to result from local heating in the solar lower atmosphere. This paper presents numerical simulations of magnetic reconnection occurring in such a deep atmosphere, with the aim to account for the common features of the two phenomena. Our n umerical results manifest the following two typical characteristics of the assumed reconnection process: (1) magnetic reconnection saturates in simila r to 600-900 s, which is just the lifetime of the two phenomena; (2) ioniza tion in the upper chromosphere consumes quite a large part of the energy re leased through reconnection, making the heating effect most significant in the lower chromosphere. The application of the reconnection model to the tw o phenomena is discussed in detail.