  We present two-dimensional resistive magnetohydrodynamic simulations of
line-tied asymmetric magnetic reconnection in the context of solar flare and
coronal mass ejection current sheets. The reconnection process is made
asymmetric along the inflow direction by allowing the initial upstream magnetic
field strengths and densities to differ, and along the outflow direction by
placing the initial perturbation near a conducting wall boundary that
represents the photosphere. When the upstream magnetic fields are asymmetric,
the post-flare loop structure is distorted into a characteristic skewed candle
flame shape. The simulations can thus be used to provide constraints on the
reconnection asymmetry in post-flare loops. More hard X-ray emission is
expected to occur at the footpoint on the weak magnetic field side because
energetic particles are more likely to escape the magnetic mirror there than at
the strong magnetic field footpoint. The footpoint on the weak magnetic field
side is predicted to move more quickly because of the requirement in two
dimensions that equal amounts of flux must be reconnected from each upstream
region. The X-line drifts away from the conducting wall in all simulations with
asymmetric outflow and into the strong magnetic field region during most of the
simulations with asymmetric inflow. There is net plasma flow across the X-line
for both the inflow and outflow directions. The reconnection exhaust directed
away from the obstructing wall is significantly faster than the exhaust
directed towards it. The asymmetric inflow condition allows net vorticity in
the rising outflow plasmoid which would appear as rolling motions about the
flux rope axis.
