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

It's the first time the observatory – which was placed into space last year – can watch our star during its maximum activity cycle.

As per research, this occurs approximately every 11 years when the Sun's magnetic poles flip – a similar Earth scenario could be the planet's poles swapping positions.

It's a time of great turbulence. It sees the Sun transition from calm to stormy and features a significant rise in the number of solar eruptions and massive solar flares – massive bubbles of fire that erupt from the solar corona.

Composed of charged particles, a coronal mass ejection may have a mass of billions of tons and reach velocities of up to 3,000km per second. It can travel toward various directions, including towards our planet. At maximum velocity, it would take an ejection about half a day to cover the vast distance Earth-Sun distance.

"In the normal or quiet periods, the Sun emits a few solar eruptions daily," says a leading scientist. "Next year, it's anticipated them to be over ten each day."

Researching CMEs ranks among the key scientific objectives of India's first solar observatory. Firstly, because the ejections offer a chance to learn about the star in the center of our planetary system, and secondly, since events occurring on the solar surface threaten infrastructure on our planet and in space.

Impacts on Earth and Space Infrastructure

Coronal mass ejections rarely pose a direct threat to human life, yet they impact our planet by causing magnetic disturbances affecting the weather in near space, where nearly thousands of spacecraft, comprising many from India, are stationed.

"The most beautiful displays from solar eruptions are auroras, being a clear example that charged particles from Sun are travelling to Earth," the scientist clarifies.

"However, they may make all the electronics on a satellite fail, disable power grids and affect meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Past Solar Events

• The strongest solar event in history was the 1859 solar superstorm that disabled communication systems across the globe
• During 1989, a part of Quebec's power grid was knocked out, leaving six million people without power for hours
• During late 2015, solar storms disrupted flight operations, causing disruption in Sweden and various European airports
• Recently in 2022, an ejection caused dozens of spacecraft being lost

If we are able to observe what happens on the Sun's corona and spot a solar storm or solar eruption in real time, record its temperature at origin and watch its trajectory, it can work as advanced warning to shut down power grids and spacecraft redirecting them out of harm's way.

Aditya-L1's Special Capability

While other solar missions observing the Sun, Aditya-L1 holds an edge over others when it comes to watching the corona.

"Aditya-L1's coronagraph has perfect dimensions enabling it to effectively simulate lunar coverage, fully covering the Sun's photosphere permitting an uninterrupted view of almost all solar atmosphere around the clock, throughout the year, including during eclipses and occultations," notes the researcher.

Essentially, this instrument acts like a synthetic eclipse, obscuring the Sun's bright surface to let researchers continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – something the real Moon provide only during eclipses.

Moreover, this is the only mission capable of examining solar events in visible light, letting it measure a CME's temperature and thermal output – crucial data indicating how strong of an eruption when traveling toward Earth.

Readiness for Maximum Activity

To prepare for the upcoming peak solar activity period, researchers worked together analyzing the data obtained from a major solar eruption recorded by the mission has observed recently.

It originated in September 2024 during early hours. The eruption's weight was 270 million tonnes – for comparison that struck the ship weighed much less.

Initially, its temperature reached extreme levels with energy equivalent comparable to 2.2 million megatons of explosives – relative to nuclear weapons used in Japan were 15 kilotons in scale respectively.

Even though these figures make it sound massive, the scientist classifies it as a "medium-sized" one.

The space rock that eliminated the dinosaurs on Earth carried enormous energy and when the Sun's maximum activity cycle, we could see CMEs carrying power matching even more than that.

"In my view the CME we evaluated to have occurred during periods of typical solar activity. Now this sets the standard that we'll be using to evaluate what is in store when the maximum activity cycle arrives," he states.

"The learnings from this will assist in developing the countermeasures to implement safeguarding satellites in orbit. Additionally, they'll aid achieving a better understanding of our space environment," he adds.