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For Aditya-L1, 2026 is expected to be like no other.

It's the first time the observatory – which was placed in orbit recently – can observe the Sun when it reaches the peak of its solar cycle.

According to scientific data, it comes roughly every 11 years as the Sun's magnetic poles flip – the Earth equivalent would be the planet's poles changing places.

This period of great turbulence. It sees the Sun changing from peaceful to violent and features a huge increase in the number of solar eruptions and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – enormous clouds of plasma that erupt of the Sun's outermost layer.

Composed of charged particles, a coronal mass ejection may have a mass of billions of tons and reach a speed of up to 3,000km per second. It can travel toward various directions, including towards our planet. At top speed, the journey takes an ejection 15 hours to cover the 150 million km Earth-Sun distance.

"In the normal or low-activity times, the Sun launches a few solar eruptions daily," explains a leading scientist. "Next year, we expect there will be 10 or more each day."

Studying coronal mass ejections ranks among the key research goals for the Indian maiden solar mission. One, because the ejections offer a chance to study the Sun at the centre of our solar system, and secondly, since events that take place on the solar surface endanger systems on our planet and in orbit.

Impacts on Earth and Orbital Systems

Coronal mass ejections rarely pose a direct threat to human life, but they do affect our planet by causing magnetic disturbances affecting conditions in Earth's vicinity, where about thousands of spacecraft, including Indian satellites, orbit.

"The most spectacular manifestations from solar eruptions include northern lights, being a clear example that charged particles from our star are travelling to Earth," the expert explains.

"However, they may cause electronic systems aboard spacecraft fail, knock down power grids and disrupt meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Past Solar Incidents

• The most powerful solar storm ever recorded was the 1859 solar superstorm that disabled telegraph lines worldwide
• During 1989, a part of Canadian electrical network failed, leaving six million people without power for nine hours
• During late 2015, solar storms disturbed air traffic control, leading to disruption across Scandinavia and various European airports
• Recently in 2022, a CME had led to dozens of spacecraft being lost

With capability to observe what happens in the solar atmosphere and spot a solar storm or a coronal mass ejection in real time, measure its heat at origin and watch its trajectory, it can work as a forewarning to switch off electrical systems and spacecraft and move them out of harm's way.

Aditya-L1's Unique Advantage

While other space observatories observing our star, India's spacecraft holds an edge over others when it comes to studying the solar atmosphere.

"Aditya-L1's coronagraph is the exact size enabling it to nearly mimic the Moon, fully covering the Sun's photosphere permitting continuous observation of almost all solar atmosphere 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, even during eclipses and occultations," says the expert.

In other words, this instrument functions as an artificial Moon, obscuring the Sun's bright surface allowing researchers constantly study the dim solar atmosphere – a feat the real Moon does only during eclipses.

Moreover, it's unique capable of examining solar events in visible light, letting it determine a CME's temperature and thermal output – key clues indicating how strong of an eruption when traveling our direction.

Readiness for Maximum Activity

To prepare for the upcoming peak solar activity period, scientists worked together analyzing information gathered from a major solar eruption that Aditya-L1 has recorded until now.

It originated on 13 September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. The eruption's weight was 270 million tonnes – the iceberg that struck the ship weighed much less.

Initially, the heat was 1.8 million degrees Celsius and the energy content comparable to millions of tons of explosives – in comparison the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were much smaller in scale respectively.

Even though these figures seem massive, the scientist describes it as a moderate event.

The asteroid which wiped out prehistoric life on Earth was 100 million megatons and during solar peak occurs, there may be CMEs carrying power matching greater levels.

"I consider this eruption we evaluated to have occurred when the Sun of typical solar activity. Now this sets the standard that we'll be using assessing what to expect when the maximum activity cycle arrives," he states.

"The learnings gained will help us developing protective measures to implement safeguarding satellites in near space. Additionally, they'll aid achieving a better understanding of our space environment," he concludes.