🔗 Share this article

For India's first solar observatory, the year 2026 will be truly unique.

This marks the initial occasion the observatory – that entered in orbit recently – will be able to observe the Sun when it reaches the peak of its solar cycle.

According to research, this occurs roughly every 11 years when the Sun's polarity reverses – a similar Earth scenario would be the planet's poles swapping positions.

This period of great turbulence. It sees our star transition from peaceful to violent and is marked by a huge increase in the frequency of solar storms and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – massive bubbles of fire that blow out of the Sun's outermost layer.

Composed of ionized particles, a coronal mass ejection may have a mass up to a trillion kilograms and can attain velocities of up to 3,000km per second. It can travel toward various directions, even toward the Earth. At maximum velocity, the journey takes an ejection 15 hours to cover the 150 million km Earth-Sun distance.

"During typical or quiet periods, the Sun launches two to three CMEs daily," says a leading scientist. "Next year, it's anticipated them to be over ten daily."

Researching CMEs is one of the most important scientific objectives for the Indian maiden solar mission. Firstly, as these eruptions provide an opportunity to study the star in the center of our planetary system, and secondly, since events that take place on the solar surface threaten infrastructure on our planet and in space.

Impacts on Our Planet and Orbital Systems

CMEs rarely pose immediate danger to people, yet they impact life on Earth through generating geomagnetic storms affecting the weather in Earth's vicinity, where nearly 11,000 satellites, including many from India, are stationed.

"The most beautiful displays of a CME are auroras, which are a clear example that charged particles from Sun journey to Earth," the expert explains.

"But they can also cause electronic systems aboard spacecraft malfunction, disable electrical networks and disrupt weather and communication satellites."

Past Solar Events

• The most powerful solar storm ever recorded occurred during the Carrington Event which knocked out communication systems across the globe
• In 1989, a part of Canadian electrical network failed, leaving millions in darkness for nine hours
• During late 2015, solar storms disturbed air traffic control, leading to chaos in Sweden and some other European airports
• In February 2022, a CME caused 38 commercial satellites failing

With capability to observe what happens in the solar atmosphere and detect solar activity or a coronal mass ejection as it happens, record its temperature at the source and watch its trajectory, this serves as advanced warning to shut down electrical systems and spacecraft redirecting them out of harm's way.

Aditya-L1's Special Capability

While other solar missions observing the Sun, Aditya-L1 has an advantage over others regarding watching the corona.

"The instrument is the exact size enabling it to effectively simulate the Moon, fully covering the Sun's photosphere permitting continuous observation of almost all solar atmosphere 24 hours a day, throughout the year, even during solar events," says the expert.

In other words, the coronagraph acts like an artificial Moon, obscuring the solar glare to let scientists continuously observe its faint outer corona – something natural eclipses does only during specific moments.

Moreover, this is the only mission that can study solar events using optical wavelengths, enabling it to determine a CME's temperature and thermal output – crucial data indicating how strong of an eruption when traveling toward Earth.

Readiness for Peak Period

In preparation for the upcoming solar maximum, researchers collaborated to study information obtained from a major solar eruption recorded by the mission has recorded until now.

This event began on 13 September 2024 during early hours. The eruption's weight was 270 million tonnes – the iceberg that struck the ship was 1.5 million tonnes.

Initially, the heat was 1.8 million degrees Celsius with energy equivalent was equivalent to 2.2 million megatons of TNT – in comparison the atomic bombs used in Japan were much smaller in scale each.

Even though these figures seem massive, the scientist describes it as a moderate event.

The space rock that eliminated the dinosaurs on Earth carried enormous energy and when solar peak occurs, we could see eruptions with energy content matching even more than that.

"In my view the CME we analyzed to have occurred when the Sun was in the normal activity phase. This establishes the standard that we'll be using assessing what to expect during solar maximum arrives," he states.

"The insights gained will help us developing the countermeasures to be adopted safeguarding satellites in orbit. They will also help us gain a better understanding of near-Earth space," he adds.