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

This marks the initial occasion the spacecraft – which was placed in orbit last year – can observe the Sun during its maximum activity cycle.

According to research, this occurs roughly every 11 years as the Sun's magnetic poles flip – a similar Earth scenario would be the North and South poles changing places.

This period of great turbulence. It sees the Sun changing from peaceful to violent and features a significant rise in the number of solar storms and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – enormous clouds of fire that blow out of the Sun's outermost layer.

Made up of ionized particles, a coronal mass ejection can weigh up to a trillion kilograms and reach velocities of up to 3,000km per second. It can travel toward various directions, including towards our planet. At top speed, it would take a CME about half a day to traverse the 150 million km Earth-Sun distance.

"During typical or quiet periods, the Sun emits two to three CMEs daily," explains a leading scientist. "Next year, we expect them to be over ten each day."

Studying CMEs ranks among the most important scientific objectives of India's maiden solar mission. Firstly, as these eruptions provide an opportunity to learn about the star at the centre of our planetary system, and two, since events that take place on the Sun threaten infrastructure on our planet and in orbit.

Effects on Our Planet and Space Infrastructure

CMEs rarely pose immediate danger to people, yet they impact life on Earth through generating geomagnetic storms that impact conditions in Earth's vicinity, where about 11,000 satellites, comprising Indian satellites, are stationed.

"The most spectacular displays from solar eruptions include northern lights, being a clear example that charged particles from Sun are travelling toward our planet," the scientist clarifies.

"But they can also cause electronic systems on a satellite fail, disable power grids and disrupt meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Past Solar Incidents

• The strongest solar event ever recorded occurred during the Carrington Event which knocked out telegraph lines across the globe
• In 1989, a part of Quebec's power grid failed, affecting six million people without power for nine hours
• During late 2015, solar activity disrupted air traffic control, causing disruption in Sweden and some other European airports
• Recently in 2022, an ejection had led to 38 commercial satellites failing

With capability to observe what happens on the Sun's corona and detect a solar storm or a coronal mass ejection in real time, record its temperature at origin and watch its trajectory, it can work as a forewarning to switch off power grids and spacecraft redirecting them to safety.

Aditya-L1's Special Capability

While other solar missions observing our star, Aditya-L1 has an advantage over others when it comes to watching the corona.

"The instrument has perfect dimensions enabling it to effectively simulate lunar coverage, completely blocking the Sun's photosphere permitting an uninterrupted view of almost all solar atmosphere around the clock, 365 days a year, including during eclipses and occultations," says the expert.

Essentially, this instrument functions as a synthetic eclipse, blocking the Sun's bright surface to let researchers continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – something the real Moon provide only during specific moments.

Additionally, it's unique that can study eruptions in visible light, letting it determine a CME's temperature and heat energy – key clues that show the intensity of an eruption if it headed our direction.

Preparation for Peak Period

To prepare for next year's peak solar activity period, scientists collaborated to study the data obtained from one of the largest solar eruption that Aditya-L1 has observed recently.

It originated in September 2024 during early hours. Its mass totaled billions of tons – the iceberg that sank Titanic weighed much less.

Initially, its temperature was 1.8 million degrees Celsius with energy equivalent comparable to millions of tons of explosives – in comparison nuclear weapons used in Japan were 15 kilotons in scale respectively.

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

The asteroid that eliminated the dinosaurs on our planet was 100 million megatons and when the Sun's maximum activity cycle, we could see CMEs carrying power equal to even more than that.

"I consider the CME we analyzed happened when the Sun was in the normal activity phase. This establishes the standard that we'll be using to evaluate what is in store during solar maximum occurs," he states.

"The learnings from this will assist in work out the countermeasures to implement safeguarding spacecraft in near space. Additionally, they'll aid achieving deeper knowledge of our space environment," he concludes.