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Regarding Aditya-L1, the year 2026 is expected to be truly unique.

It's the first time the spacecraft – which was placed in orbit recently – can watch our star during the peak of its solar cycle.

As per research, this occurs approximately every 11 years as the Sun's polarity reverses – the Earth equivalent could be the planet's poles changing places.

It's a time of great turbulence. It involves our star changing from calm to stormy and is marked by a significant rise in the frequency of solar eruptions and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – enormous clouds of plasma that blow out 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 per second. It can travel in any direction, even toward the Earth. At maximum velocity, it would take a CME 15 hours to traverse the 150 million km between Earth and the Sun.

"In the normal or quiet periods, the Sun emits two to three CMEs daily," explains an astrophysics expert. "Next year, it's anticipated there will be 10 or more each day."

Studying coronal mass ejections ranks among 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 solar system, and two, because activities occurring on the Sun endanger systems on our planet and in space.

Effects on Our Planet and Space Infrastructure

Coronal mass ejections rarely pose immediate danger to people, yet they impact life on Earth by causing geomagnetic storms that impact conditions in Earth's vicinity, where about 11,000 satellites, comprising Indian satellites, orbit.

"The most beautiful displays of a CME include northern lights, being a clear example that charged particles from Sun are travelling to Earth," the scientist explains.

"However, they may make all the electronics on a satellite malfunction, knock down electrical networks and affect meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Historical Solar Incidents

• The strongest solar storm in history occurred during the Carrington Event that disabled telegraph lines worldwide
• During 1989, sections of Canadian electrical network was knocked out, leaving millions in darkness for hours
• During late 2015, solar storms disturbed air traffic control, leading to chaos in Sweden and some other European airports
• Recently in 2022, an ejection had led to dozens of spacecraft being lost

With capability to see what happens in the solar atmosphere and detect a solar storm or solar eruption as it happens, record its temperature at the source and watch its path, this serves as advanced warning to switch off electrical systems and satellites and move them to safety.

The Mission's Unique Advantage

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

"The instrument has perfect dimensions that lets it nearly mimic the Moon, completely blocking the Sun's photosphere permitting an uninterrupted view of nearly the entire of the corona 24 hours a day, throughout the year, even during eclipses and occultations," notes the researcher.

Essentially, the coronagraph functions as an artificial Moon, obscuring the solar glare to let scientists continuously observe its faint outer corona – a feat the real Moon provide only during eclipses.

Additionally, it's unique that can study solar events in visible light, letting it measure a CME's temperature and thermal output – crucial data that show how strong of an eruption when traveling toward Earth.

Preparation for Maximum Activity

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

This event began on 13 September 2024 during early hours. Its mass totaled billions of tons – for comparison that struck the ship weighed much less.

Initially, the heat reached extreme levels and the energy content comparable to 2.2 million megatons of TNT – relative to nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were much smaller in scale respectively.

Although these figures seem incredibly large, the scientist describes it as a "medium-sized" one.

The space rock that eliminated the dinosaurs on Earth carried enormous energy and when solar peak occurs, there may be eruptions carrying power equal to greater levels.

"I consider this eruption we evaluated happened during periods was in the normal activity phase. Now this sets the benchmark for future comparison to evaluate what is in store when the maximum activity cycle arrives," he states.

"The insights gained will help us work out protective measures to implement safeguarding satellites in orbit. Additionally, they'll aid achieving deeper knowledge of near-Earth space," he concludes.