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For India's first solar observatory, the year 2026 will be truly unique.

This marks the initial occasion the spacecraft – that entered into space recently – will be able to watch our star during its maximum activity cycle.

According to research, it comes approximately once every 11 years when the Sun's polarity reverses – a similar Earth scenario could be the planet's poles changing places.

It's a time marked by intense activity. It sees the Sun changing from peaceful to violent and is marked by a huge increase in the frequency of solar storms and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – massive bubbles of fire that blow out of the Sun's outermost layer.

Made up of ionized particles, a coronal mass ejection can weigh up to a trillion kilograms and reach a speed of up to 3,000km each second. It can travel in any direction, even toward the Earth. At top speed, the journey takes an ejection about half a day to cover the vast distance between Earth and the Sun.

"In the normal or low-activity times, the Sun launches two to three CMEs a day," explains an astrophysics expert. "Next year, it's anticipated there will be over ten each day."

Studying CMEs ranks among the most important scientific objectives of India's maiden solar mission. One, as these eruptions offer a chance to study the Sun at the centre of our planetary system, and two, since events that take place on the Sun endanger systems on Earth and in space.

Effects on Earth and Space Infrastructure

Coronal mass ejections seldom present a direct threat to human life, but they do affect life on Earth through generating geomagnetic storms affecting conditions in near space, where nearly 11,000 satellites, comprising many from India, orbit.

"The most spectacular manifestations from solar eruptions include northern lights, which are a clear example that solar particles from Sun journey toward our planet," the expert explains.

"However, they may cause electronic systems on a satellite malfunction, disable electrical networks and affect meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Historical Solar Events

• The most powerful solar storm in history was the Carrington Event that disabled communication systems worldwide
• During 1989, sections of Canadian electrical network was knocked out, affecting six million people in darkness for nine hours
• In November 2015, solar activity disturbed air traffic control, leading to chaos in Sweden and various European air hubs
• Recently in 2022, an ejection had led to dozens of spacecraft failing

With capability to observe events in the solar atmosphere and spot solar activity or a coronal mass ejection in real time, measure its heat at origin and watch its path, it can work as a forewarning to shut down electrical systems and satellites and move them to safety.

The Mission's Unique Advantage

There are other space observatories watching the Sun, Aditya-L1 holds an edge compared to rivals when it comes to studying the solar atmosphere.

"Aditya-L1's coronagraph is the exact size enabling it to effectively simulate lunar coverage, completely blocking the Sun's photosphere permitting an uninterrupted view of almost all of the corona 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, including during eclipses and occultations," says the expert.

In other words, the coronagraph functions as a synthetic eclipse, blocking the solar glare to let researchers constantly study its faint outer corona – a feat the real Moon provide only during specific moments.

Additionally, this is the only mission that can study solar events in visible light, enabling it to determine a CME's temperature and thermal output – key clues that show the intensity of an eruption when traveling toward Earth.

Readiness for Maximum Activity

In preparation for next year's peak solar activity period, researchers worked together to study the data obtained from a major solar eruption recorded by the mission has observed recently.

This event began on 13 September 2024 during early hours. The eruption's weight totaled billions of tons – for comparison that struck the ship was 1.5 million tonnes.

Initially, the heat was 1.8 million degrees Celsius with energy equivalent comparable to millions of tons of explosives – in comparison the atomic bombs used in Japan were much smaller in scale each.

Even though the numbers seem incredibly large, the scientist classifies it as a "medium-sized" one.

The space rock that eliminated prehistoric life on Earth carried enormous energy and during solar peak occurs, there may be eruptions with energy content equal to greater levels.

"In my view the CME we evaluated happened during periods was in the normal activity phase. This establishes the benchmark that we'll be using to evaluate what is in store during solar maximum occurs," he says.

"The learnings from this will assist in work out protective measures to be adopted to protect satellites in near space. They will also help us gain a better understanding of our space environment," he concludes.