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Regarding India's first solar observatory, the year 2026 is expected to be like no other.

It's the first time the observatory – that entered in orbit last year – will be able to watch our star during the peak of its solar cycle.

As per research, it comes roughly once every 11 years when the Sun's polarity reverses – the Earth equivalent could be the North and South poles changing places.

This period of great turbulence. It sees the Sun transition from peaceful to violent and features a significant rise in the number of solar eruptions and massive solar flares – enormous clouds of plasma that erupt of the Sun's outermost layer.

Composed of ionized particles, a CME may have a mass up to a trillion kilograms and can attain velocities exceeding 2,000 miles per second. It can travel in any direction, even toward our planet. At top speed, the journey takes an ejection 15 hours to traverse the vast distance Earth-Sun distance.

"In the normal or quiet periods, the Sun launches two to three CMEs daily," explains a leading scientist. "Next year, it's anticipated there will be over ten daily."

Researching CMEs is one of the most important scientific objectives for the Indian maiden solar mission. Firstly, as these eruptions provide an opportunity to learn about the Sun in the center of our planetary system, and secondly, since events that take place on the solar surface endanger infrastructure on Earth and in orbit.

Impacts on Our Planet and Space Infrastructure

CMEs seldom present immediate danger to human life, but they do affect life on Earth through generating geomagnetic storms affecting the weather in near space, where nearly 11,000 satellites, comprising Indian satellites, orbit.

"The most beautiful displays from solar eruptions include northern lights, being direct evidence that charged particles from our star journey to Earth," the scientist explains.

"But they can also cause electronic systems on a satellite malfunction, disable power grids and affect meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Historical Solar Incidents

• The most powerful solar event in history occurred during the 1859 solar superstorm which knocked out telegraph lines across the globe
• In 1989, a part of Quebec's power grid was knocked out, affecting six million people without power for nine hours
• In November 2015, solar storms disturbed flight operations, leading to chaos across Scandinavia and some other European air hubs
• Recently in 2022, an ejection had led to 38 commercial satellites being lost

If we are able to observe what happens on the Sun's corona and spot solar activity or a coronal mass ejection as it happens, record its temperature at the source and watch its trajectory, this serves as a forewarning to switch off power grids and satellites redirecting them to safety.

The Mission's Unique Advantage

There are other solar missions watching our star, Aditya-L1 has an advantage over others regarding studying the solar atmosphere.

"The instrument is the exact size enabling it to effectively simulate the Moon, fully covering the Sun's photosphere permitting continuous observation of nearly the entire of the corona around the clock, 365 days a year, even during solar events," notes the expert.

In other words, this instrument functions as an artificial Moon, obscuring the solar glare to let scientists constantly study the dim solar atmosphere – a feat natural eclipses provide only during eclipses.

Moreover, this is the only mission that can study eruptions using optical wavelengths, letting it measure a CME's temperature and heat energy – key clues that show how strong of an eruption if it headed our direction.

Preparation for Peak Period

To prepare for the upcoming solar maximum, scientists worked together analyzing the data gathered from a major CMEs recorded by the mission has observed recently.

This event began on 13 September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. The eruption's weight totaled billions of tons – for comparison that sank Titanic weighed much less.

Initially, its temperature was 1.8 million degrees Celsius with energy equivalent was equivalent to millions of tons of explosives – in comparison the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were much smaller and 21 kilotons respectively.

Even though these figures make it sound incredibly large, the expert classifies it as a moderate event.

The asteroid which wiped out prehistoric life on Earth was 100 million megatons and when the Sun's maximum activity cycle, there may be eruptions carrying power equal to greater levels.

"I consider this eruption we evaluated happened when the Sun of typical solar activity. This establishes the benchmark for future comparison assessing what is in store during solar maximum arrives," he states.

"The insights gained will assist in work out protective measures to be adopted safeguarding spacecraft in near space. They will also help us gain a better understanding of our space environment," he adds.