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Regarding India's first solar observatory, 2026 will be like no other.

This marks the initial occasion the observatory – that entered into space recently – can watch the Sun when it reaches the peak of its solar cycle.

As per scientific data, it comes approximately once every 11 years when the Sun's magnetic poles flip – a similar Earth scenario would be the planet's poles changing places.

It's a time of great turbulence. It involves the Sun changing from peaceful to violent and is marked by a significant rise in the number of solar eruptions and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – enormous clouds of fire that blow out from the solar corona.

Composed of charged particles, a coronal mass ejection can weigh up to a trillion kilograms and reach velocities of up to 3,000km per second. It can head out toward various directions, even toward the Earth. At maximum velocity, it would take an ejection 15 hours to traverse the 150 million km between Earth and the Sun.

"In the normal or quiet periods, our star launches a few solar eruptions a day," explains an astrophysics expert. "In 2026, we expect them to be 10 or more each day."

Researching CMEs is one of the key research goals of India's maiden solar mission. One, as these eruptions offer a chance to learn about the star in the center of our planetary system, and secondly, since events that take place on the solar surface threaten systems on Earth and in orbit.

Effects on Earth and Space Infrastructure

Coronal mass ejections seldom present immediate danger to human life, but they do affect life on Earth through generating magnetic disturbances that impact conditions in near space, where nearly 11,000 satellites, comprising Indian satellites, are stationed.

"The most spectacular manifestations from solar eruptions include northern lights, which are direct evidence that charged particles from our star are travelling toward our planet," the expert clarifies.

"However, they may make all the electronics aboard spacecraft fail, knock down electrical networks and affect weather and communication satellites."

Historical Solar Incidents

• The strongest solar event ever recorded occurred during the 1859 solar superstorm that disabled telegraph lines worldwide
• During 1989, sections of Canadian electrical network was knocked out, affecting six million people without power for hours
• In November 2015, solar storms disturbed air traffic control, causing chaos in Sweden and some other European airports
• In February 2022, a CME had led to 38 commercial satellites being lost

With capability to observe what happens in the solar atmosphere and spot a solar storm or a coronal mass ejection as it happens, record its temperature at the source and track its trajectory, it can work as a forewarning to switch off electrical systems and spacecraft redirecting them to safety.

The Mission's Special Capability

While other space observatories watching the Sun, Aditya-L1 has an advantage over others regarding studying the solar atmosphere.

"Aditya-L1's coronagraph is the exact size that lets it effectively simulate the Moon, completely blocking the solar disk and allowing it an uninterrupted view of nearly the entire solar atmosphere around the clock, 365 days a year, even during eclipses and occultations," says the researcher.

Essentially, the coronagraph acts like an artificial Moon, obscuring the Sun's bright surface to let researchers constantly study the dim solar atmosphere – something natural eclipses does only during eclipses.

Additionally, it's unique capable of examining solar events in visible light, letting it measure a CME's temperature and heat energy – key clues that show the intensity a CME would be when traveling our direction.

Preparation for Peak Period

In preparation for the upcoming peak solar activity period, scientists worked together analyzing the data gathered from one of the largest solar eruption recorded by the mission has observed recently.

It originated on 13 September 2024 during early hours. The eruption's weight totaled billions of tons – the iceberg that sank Titanic weighed much less.

Initially, the heat was 1.8 million degrees Celsius and the energy content was equivalent to 2.2 million megatons of explosives – relative to the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were much smaller and 21 kilotons each.

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

The asteroid which wiped out the dinosaurs on Earth was 100 million megatons and when solar peak occurs, there may be eruptions with energy content equal to even more than that.

"In my view the CME we analyzed to have occurred during periods was in the normal activity phase. Now this sets the benchmark for future comparison assessing what to expect when the maximum activity cycle occurs," he states.

"The learnings gained will assist in work out the countermeasures to be adopted safeguarding spacecraft in near space. They will also help us gain a better understanding of near-Earth space," he adds.