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Regarding Aditya-L1, 2026 will be like no other.

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

According to scientific data, it comes roughly once every 11 years as the Sun's polarity reverses – the Earth equivalent would be the planet's poles swapping positions.

This period marked by intense activity. It involves the Sun changing from peaceful to violent and features a huge increase in the number of solar eruptions and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – massive bubbles of plasma that erupt of the Sun's outermost layer.

Made up of charged particles, a CME may have a mass up to a trillion kilograms and reach velocities of up to 3,000km each second. It can travel toward various directions, even toward our planet. At top speed, it would take an ejection about half a day to traverse the 150 million km between Earth and the Sun.

"In the normal or quiet periods, the Sun emits two to three CMEs a day," explains a leading scientist. "Next year, we expect them to be 10 or more each day."

Researching CMEs is one of the key scientific objectives of India's first solar observatory. One, because the ejections offer a chance to learn about the star in the center of our planetary system, and secondly, because activities occurring on the solar surface threaten systems on our planet and in orbit.

Effects on Earth and Space Infrastructure

CMEs rarely pose a direct threat to human life, yet they impact life on Earth through generating magnetic disturbances affecting the weather in near space, where about 11,000 satellites, including many from India, orbit.

"The most spectacular manifestations from solar eruptions are auroras, which are a clear example that solar particles from our star are travelling toward our planet," the expert explains.

"However, they may make all the electronics aboard spacecraft malfunction, knock down power grids and affect weather and communication satellites."

Historical Solar Incidents

• The strongest solar event in history was the Carrington Event which knocked out communication systems worldwide
• In 1989, a part of Canadian electrical network failed, affecting millions in darkness for nine hours
• In November 2015, solar activity disrupted air traffic control, causing chaos across Scandinavia and various European airports
• Recently in 2022, a CME caused 38 commercial satellites being lost

If we are able to observe events in the solar atmosphere and detect a solar storm or a coronal mass ejection in real time, measure its heat at origin and watch its trajectory, it can work as a forewarning to shut down electrical systems and satellites and move them out of harm's way.

The Mission's Unique Advantage

There are other solar missions watching our star, Aditya-L1 has an advantage compared to rivals when it comes to watching the corona.

"The instrument is the exact size that lets it nearly mimic lunar coverage, completely blocking the Sun's photosphere and allowing it an uninterrupted view of nearly the entire solar atmosphere around the clock, 365 days a year, including during solar events," notes the researcher.

In other words, this instrument functions as an artificial Moon, blocking the solar glare to let scientists continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – something natural eclipses provide only during specific moments.

Additionally, this is the only mission that can study eruptions in visible light, enabling it to measure eruption heat and heat energy – crucial data indicating the intensity a CME would be if it headed toward Earth.

Readiness for Maximum Activity

To prepare for next year's solar maximum, scientists worked together analyzing the data gathered from a major solar eruption recorded by the mission has observed recently.

It originated in September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. The eruption's weight totaled billions of tons – for comparison that sank Titanic weighed much less.

Initially, its temperature was 1.8 million degrees Celsius with energy equivalent was equivalent to 2.2 million megatons of explosives – relative to the atomic bombs used in Japan were much smaller and 21 kilotons respectively.

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

The space rock that eliminated the dinosaurs on Earth was 100 million megatons and during solar peak occurs, we could see eruptions carrying power matching even more than that.

"I consider the CME we evaluated to have occurred during periods was in the normal activity phase. Now this sets the standard that we'll be using assessing what is in store when the maximum activity cycle arrives," he states.

"The learnings gained will assist in work out protective measures to be adopted safeguarding satellites in near space. Additionally, they'll aid achieving deeper knowledge of near-Earth space," he concludes.