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

It's the first time the spacecraft – that entered into space last year – can observe the Sun when it reaches its maximum activity cycle.

As per research, this occurs approximately once every 11 years as the Sun's polarity reverses – a similar Earth scenario could be the North and South poles changing places.

It's a time of great turbulence. It sees the Sun transition from peaceful to violent and features a significant rise in the frequency of solar storms and massive solar flares – enormous clouds of plasma that erupt from the solar corona.

Composed of charged particles, a CME can weigh up to a trillion kilograms and reach a speed of up to 3,000km each second. It can head out in any direction, even toward our planet. At maximum velocity, the journey takes a CME about half a day to cover the 150 million km Earth-Sun distance.

"During typical or low-activity times, our star emits a few solar eruptions daily," says an astrophysics expert. "Next year, we expect there will be over ten each day."

Studying CMEs is one of the key scientific objectives of India's first solar observatory. One, as these eruptions offer a chance to study the star at the centre of our planetary system, and secondly, since events occurring on the solar surface endanger infrastructure on our planet and in space.

Impacts on Our Planet and Space Infrastructure

Coronal mass ejections rarely pose a direct threat to people, yet they impact our planet by causing geomagnetic storms affecting the weather in Earth's vicinity, where about 11,000 satellites, including many from India, are stationed.

"The most spectacular displays of a CME include northern lights, being a clear example that charged particles from Sun are travelling toward our planet," the expert explains.

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

Historical Solar Events

• The strongest solar event in history was the Carrington Event which knocked out communication systems across the globe
• During 1989, a part of Quebec's power grid was knocked out, affecting six million people without power for hours
• During late 2015, solar activity disrupted air traffic control, leading to chaos across Scandinavia and some other European air hubs
• In February 2022, a CME caused dozens of spacecraft being lost

With capability to observe events on the Sun's corona and spot a solar storm or a coronal mass ejection in real time, measure its heat at the source and watch its path, it can work as advanced warning to shut down electrical systems and spacecraft and move them out of harm's way.

Aditya-L1's Unique Advantage

While other space observatories observing the Sun, Aditya-L1 has an advantage compared to rivals regarding watching the corona.

"The instrument is the exact size that lets it nearly mimic lunar coverage, fully covering the solar disk and allowing it an uninterrupted view of nearly the entire of the corona 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, even during eclipses and occultations," notes the researcher.

In other words, the coronagraph functions as a synthetic eclipse, blocking the solar glare allowing scientists continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – something the real Moon does only during specific moments.

Moreover, it's unique that can study solar events using optical wavelengths, enabling it to determine eruption heat and heat energy – key clues indicating how strong of an eruption when traveling toward Earth.

Readiness for Peak Period

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

It originated in September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. Its mass was 270 million tonnes – the iceberg that struck the ship was 1.5 million tonnes.

Initially, its temperature reached extreme levels and the energy content was equivalent to 2.2 million megatons of TNT – relative to the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 15 kilotons in scale each.

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

The space rock which wiped out prehistoric life on Earth carried enormous energy and during the Sun's maximum activity cycle, there may be eruptions carrying power matching greater levels.

"In my view the CME we evaluated to have occurred when the Sun was in the normal activity phase. This establishes the standard for future comparison assessing what to expect when the maximum activity cycle occurs," he says.

"The learnings from this will assist in developing the countermeasures to implement safeguarding satellites in near space. Additionally, they'll aid achieving a better understanding of near-Earth space," he concludes.