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For Aditya-L1, the year 2026 will be truly unique.

This marks the initial occasion the observatory – which was placed in orbit recently – will be able to observe the Sun during the peak of its solar cycle.

According to research, it comes roughly once every 11 years when the Sun's polarity reverses – a similar Earth scenario could be the planet's poles changing places.

It's a time of great turbulence. It sees our star changing from calm to stormy and is marked by a huge increase in the number of solar eruptions and massive solar flares – massive bubbles of fire that erupt of the Sun's outermost layer.

Made up of ionized particles, a coronal mass ejection may have a mass of billions of tons and can attain a speed exceeding 2,000 miles per second. It can travel in any direction, including towards our planet. At maximum velocity, it would take a CME 15 hours to cover the vast distance between Earth and the Sun.

"During typical or quiet periods, the Sun emits two to three CMEs daily," says an astrophysics expert. "In 2026, we expect there will be 10 or more each day."

Studying CMEs is one of the most important research goals of India's maiden solar mission. Firstly, because the ejections offer a chance to study the star in the center of our planetary system, and two, because activities that take place on the solar surface threaten systems on Earth and in space.

Effects on Our Planet and Space Infrastructure

Coronal mass ejections rarely pose a direct threat to human life, but they do affect life on Earth through generating magnetic disturbances affecting the weather in near space, where about 11,000 satellites, comprising Indian satellites, orbit.

"The most beautiful displays of a CME include northern lights, which are a clear example that solar particles from our star journey toward our planet," the scientist explains.

"But they can also make all the electronics aboard spacecraft malfunction, disable electrical networks and affect meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Past Solar Events

• The strongest solar storm ever recorded was the Carrington Event which knocked out telegraph lines across the globe
• During 1989, a part of Quebec's power grid was knocked out, affecting six million people in darkness for nine hours
• In November 2015, solar storms disturbed flight operations, causing disruption across Scandinavia and some other European airports
• Recently in 2022, an ejection had led to 38 commercial satellites failing

With capability to see events on the Sun's corona and detect solar activity or a coronal mass ejection in real time, measure its heat at origin and track its path, it can work as a forewarning to shut down electrical systems and satellites redirecting them out of harm's way.

The Mission's Unique Advantage

While other solar missions watching the Sun, India's spacecraft has an advantage over others regarding studying the solar atmosphere.

"The instrument is the exact size enabling it to nearly mimic the Moon, fully covering the Sun's photosphere and allowing it continuous observation of almost all of the corona around the clock, throughout the year, even during solar events," says the researcher.

Essentially, this instrument acts like a synthetic eclipse, obscuring the solar glare to let scientists continuously observe its faint outer corona – a feat natural eclipses provide only during specific moments.

Additionally, it's unique that can study solar events using optical wavelengths, enabling it to determine eruption heat and heat energy – crucial data that show how strong of an eruption if it headed toward Earth.

Readiness for Maximum Activity

To prepare for the upcoming peak solar activity period, researchers collaborated analyzing information obtained from one of the largest solar eruption recorded by the mission has observed recently.

This event began on 13 September 2024 during early hours. Its mass was 270 million tonnes – for comparison that sank Titanic weighed much less.

At origin, its temperature was 1.8 million degrees Celsius and the energy content was equivalent to millions of tons of TNT – in comparison nuclear weapons used in Japan were much smaller in scale respectively.

Even though the numbers seem incredibly large, the scientist classifies it as a "medium-sized" one.

The space rock that eliminated prehistoric life on our planet carried enormous energy and during solar peak occurs, we could see eruptions carrying power matching even more than that.

"I consider this eruption we analyzed happened during periods was in the normal activity phase. This establishes the benchmark that we'll be using to evaluate what to expect when the maximum activity cycle arrives," he says.

"The insights from this will assist in work out protective measures to implement to protect satellites in near space. They will also help us gain a better understanding of near-Earth space," he concludes.