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Regarding India's first solar observatory, 2026 will be truly unique.

It's the first time the spacecraft – that entered in orbit last year – will be able to watch the Sun during its maximum activity cycle.

According to scientific data, this occurs roughly every 11 years as the Sun's polarity reverses – the Earth equivalent would be the planet's poles changing places.

It's a time marked by intense activity. It involves the Sun transition from calm to stormy and is marked by a huge increase in the frequency of solar storms and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – enormous clouds of plasma that blow out from the solar corona.

Composed of ionized particles, a CME may have a mass of billions of tons and can attain a speed exceeding 2,000 miles each second. It can head out in any direction, including towards the Earth. At top speed, it would take a CME 15 hours to traverse the vast distance Earth-Sun distance.

"In the normal or low-activity times, our star launches a few solar eruptions daily," explains a leading scientist. "In 2026, it's anticipated them to be over ten each day."

Studying coronal mass ejections ranks among the key research goals for the Indian first solar observatory. One, because the ejections offer a chance to learn about the Sun in the center of our solar system, and two, since events that take place on the Sun endanger infrastructure on Earth and in orbit.

Impacts on Our Planet and Orbital Systems

CMEs seldom present immediate danger to people, but they do affect life on Earth through generating geomagnetic storms that impact the weather in near space, where nearly thousands of spacecraft, including Indian satellites, are stationed.

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

"But they can also make all the electronics on a satellite malfunction, disable power grids and disrupt meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Past Solar Events

• The most powerful solar storm in history occurred during the Carrington Event which knocked out telegraph lines across the globe
• During 1989, a part of Quebec's power grid was knocked out, leaving millions in darkness for hours
• In November 2015, solar activity disturbed flight operations, causing chaos in Sweden and some other European air hubs
• Recently in 2022, a CME caused 38 commercial satellites being lost

With capability to see what happens in the solar atmosphere and spot solar activity or solar eruption as it happens, record its temperature at origin and watch its trajectory, it can work as advanced warning to switch off electrical systems and spacecraft redirecting them to safety.

Aditya-L1's Unique Advantage

There are other solar missions observing the Sun, India's spacecraft holds an edge compared to rivals 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 an uninterrupted view of almost all of the corona 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, including during solar events," says the expert.

In other words, the coronagraph functions as a synthetic eclipse, obscuring the Sun's bright surface to let researchers continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – something the real Moon does only during specific moments.

Moreover, it's unique that can study solar events in visible light, letting it measure eruption heat and thermal output – key clues indicating the intensity a CME would be when traveling our direction.

Preparation for Maximum Activity

In preparation for the upcoming peak solar activity period, scientists collaborated analyzing the data gathered from a major CMEs recorded by the mission has recorded until now.

This event began on 13 September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. Its mass was 270 million tonnes – for comparison that sank Titanic weighed much less.

At origin, the heat was 1.8 million degrees Celsius and the energy content was equivalent to 2.2 million megatons of TNT – relative to the atomic bombs used in Japan were 15 kilotons and 21 kilotons each.

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

The asteroid that eliminated prehistoric life on our planet carried enormous energy and during solar peak occurs, we could see CMEs with energy content matching even more than that.

"I consider this eruption we analyzed happened when the Sun was in the normal activity phase. Now this sets the standard for future comparison assessing what is in store when the maximum activity cycle occurs," he states.

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