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

It's the first time the spacecraft – that entered in orbit recently – can observe the Sun when it reaches its maximum activity cycle.

According to scientific data, this occurs roughly once 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 involves the Sun transition from peaceful to violent and features a significant rise in the frequency of solar eruptions and massive solar flares – enormous clouds of fire that blow out of the Sun's outermost layer.

Composed of ionized particles, a CME can weigh of billions of tons and reach a speed of up to 3,000km each second. It can travel in any direction, even toward our planet. At top speed, the journey takes a CME about half a day to traverse the vast distance between Earth and the Sun.

"During typical or low-activity times, our star emits a few solar eruptions daily," explains a leading scientist. "In 2026, it's anticipated there will be over ten daily."

Researching CMEs is one of the most important research goals for the Indian maiden solar mission. Firstly, because the ejections provide an opportunity to study the Sun in the center of our planetary system, and secondly, since events occurring on the Sun endanger systems 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 by causing magnetic disturbances affecting conditions in Earth's vicinity, where nearly thousands of spacecraft, including many from India, are stationed.

"The most beautiful manifestations of a CME include northern lights, which are a clear example that charged particles from our star are travelling toward our planet," the expert clarifies.

"But they can also cause electronic systems on a satellite fail, disable electrical networks and affect meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Past Solar Events

• The most powerful solar storm ever recorded was the Carrington Event that disabled telegraph lines across the globe
• In 1989, sections of Canadian electrical network failed, leaving six million people without power for nine hours
• In November 2015, solar storms disrupted air traffic control, causing chaos across Scandinavia and various European airports
• In February 2022, an ejection had led to dozens of spacecraft failing

With capability to observe what happens on the Sun's corona and spot solar activity or a coronal mass ejection as it happens, measure its heat at the source and track its trajectory, it can work as advanced warning to switch off power grids and spacecraft and move them out of harm's way.

Aditya-L1's Special Capability

While other solar missions watching the Sun, Aditya-L1 has an advantage over others regarding watching the corona.

"The instrument has perfect dimensions enabling it to effectively simulate lunar coverage, fully covering the solar disk permitting an uninterrupted view of nearly the entire solar atmosphere 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, even during eclipses and occultations," notes the researcher.

Essentially, the coronagraph functions as an artificial Moon, blocking the solar glare to let scientists constantly study the dim solar atmosphere – a feat the real Moon provide only during specific moments.

Moreover, this is the only mission that can study eruptions in visible light, letting it determine a CME's temperature and heat energy – crucial data that show the intensity a CME would be if it headed our direction.

Readiness for Maximum Activity

To prepare for next year's peak solar activity period, researchers collaborated to study the data obtained from a major solar eruption that Aditya-L1 has recorded until now.

This event began on 13 September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. The eruption's weight was 270 million tonnes – the iceberg that struck the ship was 1.5 million tonnes.

At origin, its temperature reached extreme levels and the energy content was equivalent to millions of tons of explosives – relative to nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 15 kilotons and 21 kilotons each.

Although these figures seem massive, the scientist describes it as a "medium-sized" one.

The asteroid that eliminated prehistoric life on our planet carried enormous energy and during the Sun's maximum activity cycle, there may be CMEs with energy content equal to even more than that.

"In my view the CME we analyzed happened when the Sun of typical solar activity. This establishes the standard that we'll be using to evaluate what to expect when the maximum activity cycle arrives," he states.

"The learnings gained will help us work out the countermeasures to implement to protect spacecraft in near space. Additionally, they'll aid us gain a better understanding of our space environment," he concludes.