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Regarding India's first solar observatory, 2026 will be truly unique.

It's the first time the spacecraft – that entered in orbit last year – can observe the Sun during its maximum activity cycle.

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

This period marked by intense activity. It sees the Sun transition from peaceful to violent and features a huge increase in the number of solar storms and massive solar flares – massive bubbles of plasma that erupt of the Sun's outermost layer.

Composed of ionized particles, a CME can weigh of billions of tons and can attain a speed of up to 3,000km each second. It can travel in any direction, including towards the Earth. At top speed, it would take a CME 15 hours to traverse the 150 million km Earth-Sun distance.

"In the normal or quiet periods, the Sun emits a few solar eruptions daily," explains a leading scientist. "Next year, it's anticipated them to be over ten daily."

Researching CMEs is one of the most important scientific objectives of India's first solar observatory. Firstly, because the ejections offer a chance to learn about the star at the centre of our solar system, and two, because activities that take place on the Sun threaten systems on Earth and in orbit.

Effects on Earth and Space Infrastructure

CMEs rarely pose a direct threat to human life, but they do affect life on Earth by causing magnetic disturbances that impact the weather in Earth's vicinity, where about 11,000 satellites, comprising Indian satellites, orbit.

"The most spectacular manifestations of a CME are auroras, being a clear example that solar particles from our star journey to Earth," the scientist explains.

"But they can also cause electronic systems on a satellite malfunction, knock down power grids and affect meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Historical Solar Events

• The most powerful solar event ever recorded occurred during the 1859 solar superstorm which knocked out communication systems worldwide
• In 1989, a part of Canadian electrical network was knocked out, affecting millions without power for nine hours
• In November 2015, solar storms disrupted air traffic control, leading to disruption in Sweden and various European airports
• Recently in 2022, a CME caused 38 commercial satellites being lost

With capability to see events on the Sun's corona and spot solar activity or solar eruption in real time, measure its heat at the source and track its path, this serves as advanced warning to switch off electrical systems and spacecraft redirecting them out of harm's way.

Aditya-L1's Special Capability

There are other solar missions watching our star, India's spacecraft has an advantage compared to rivals regarding watching the corona.

"The instrument has perfect dimensions that lets it nearly mimic the Moon, fully covering the solar disk and allowing it an uninterrupted view of nearly the entire solar atmosphere around the clock, throughout the year, even during solar events," says the researcher.

Essentially, the coronagraph functions as a synthetic eclipse, obscuring the solar glare to let researchers continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – a feat the real Moon provide only during eclipses.

Moreover, this is the only mission that can study solar events in visible light, enabling it to measure eruption heat and heat energy – crucial data that show how strong of an eruption when traveling our direction.

Preparation for Peak Period

In preparation for the upcoming peak solar activity period, researchers collaborated analyzing information obtained from a major solar eruption recorded by the mission has recorded until now.

This event began on 13 September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. The eruption's weight was 270 million tonnes – for comparison that sank Titanic was 1.5 million tonnes.

Initially, its temperature reached extreme levels and the energy content comparable to 2.2 million megatons of TNT – relative to the atomic bombs used in Japan were 15 kilotons and 21 kilotons respectively.

Even though the numbers make it sound massive, the scientist describes it as a moderate event.

The asteroid which wiped out prehistoric life on our planet was 100 million megatons and during solar peak occurs, there may be CMEs carrying power equal to greater levels.

"In my view this eruption we evaluated to have occurred when the Sun of typical solar activity. Now this sets the benchmark that we'll be using assessing what is in store during solar maximum arrives," he says.

"The insights from this will help us developing protective measures to be adopted safeguarding spacecraft in near space. Additionally, they'll aid us gain deeper knowledge of our space environment," he adds.