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Regarding India's first solar observatory, the year 2026 is expected to be truly unique.

This marks the initial occasion the observatory – which was placed in orbit last year – will be able to watch our star when it reaches its maximum activity cycle.

As per research, it comes approximately every 11 years as the Sun's polarity reverses – the Earth equivalent would be the planet's poles swapping positions.

It's a time of great turbulence. It sees the Sun transition from calm to stormy and is marked by a huge increase in the frequency of solar storms and massive solar flares – massive bubbles of plasma that erupt from the solar corona.

Made up of charged particles, a coronal mass ejection can weigh of billions of tons and can attain a speed of up to 3,000km per second. It can travel toward various directions, including towards the Earth. At top speed, it would take an ejection 15 hours to traverse the vast distance between Earth and the Sun.

"In the normal or quiet periods, our star emits two to three CMEs daily," explains a leading scientist. "Next year, it's anticipated them to be over ten daily."

Studying CMEs ranks among the key research goals of India's maiden solar mission. Firstly, as these eruptions offer a chance to learn about the Sun in the center of our solar system, and secondly, since events that take place on the Sun threaten infrastructure on our planet and in space.

Effects on Earth and Space Infrastructure

Coronal mass ejections seldom present immediate danger to people, but they do affect our planet through generating geomagnetic storms that impact the weather in near space, where about thousands of spacecraft, comprising Indian satellites, orbit.

"The most beautiful displays from solar eruptions include northern lights, which are direct evidence that charged particles from Sun journey to Earth," the expert explains.

"But they can also make all the electronics aboard spacecraft fail, knock down power grids and disrupt weather and communication satellites."

Historical Solar Incidents

• The strongest solar storm in history occurred during the 1859 solar superstorm that disabled communication systems worldwide
• During 1989, a part of Quebec's power grid was knocked out, leaving millions without power for nine hours
• In November 2015, solar activity disturbed air traffic control, causing disruption across Scandinavia and some other European air hubs
• In February 2022, a CME caused dozens of spacecraft failing

With capability to see what happens in the solar atmosphere and detect a solar storm or solar eruption as it happens, record its temperature at origin and track its trajectory, it can work as a forewarning to switch off power grids and satellites redirecting them out of harm's way.

The Mission's Special Capability

There are other solar missions 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 nearly mimic the Moon, completely blocking the Sun's photosphere and allowing it continuous observation of nearly the entire of the corona around the clock, 365 days a year, even during eclipses and occultations," notes the researcher.

In other words, the coronagraph functions as a synthetic eclipse, blocking the Sun's bright surface allowing scientists constantly study its faint outer corona – something the real Moon provide only during specific moments.

Additionally, this is the only mission that can study solar events in visible light, letting it measure a CME's temperature and heat energy – key clues indicating how strong a CME would be when traveling toward Earth.

Readiness for Maximum Activity

In preparation for next year's peak solar activity period, researchers worked together analyzing the data obtained from one of the largest solar eruption recorded by the mission has observed recently.

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

At origin, the heat reached extreme levels with energy equivalent comparable to 2.2 million megatons of explosives – in comparison nuclear weapons used in Japan were 15 kilotons and 21 kilotons each.

Although the numbers seem incredibly large, the expert classifies it as a "medium-sized" one.

The space rock that eliminated the dinosaurs on Earth carried enormous energy and during solar peak occurs, we could see eruptions with energy content matching even more than that.

"In my view this eruption we evaluated happened during periods of typical solar activity. This establishes the benchmark for future comparison assessing what to expect during solar maximum arrives," he states.

"The insights gained will help us work out the countermeasures to implement to protect satellites in orbit. Additionally, they'll aid achieving deeper knowledge of our space environment," he adds.