🔗 Share this article

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

It's the first time the observatory – 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 when the Sun's polarity reverses – the Earth equivalent could be the North and South poles swapping positions.

This period marked by intense activity. It sees the Sun changing from calm to stormy and is marked by a significant rise in the frequency of solar eruptions and massive solar flares – enormous clouds of plasma that blow out of the Sun's outermost layer.

Composed of charged particles, a CME can weigh 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 maximum velocity, the journey takes a CME about half a day to cover the vast distance between Earth and the Sun.

"In the normal or low-activity times, the Sun emits a few solar eruptions daily," says an astrophysics expert. "Next year, we expect there will be 10 or more daily."

Researching CMEs ranks among the key research goals of India's maiden solar mission. One, because the ejections provide an opportunity to study the star in the center of our solar system, and two, since events occurring on the solar surface endanger infrastructure on our planet and in orbit.

Effects on Our Planet and Space Infrastructure

CMEs seldom present immediate danger to people, but they do affect life on Earth by causing geomagnetic storms that impact the weather in Earth's vicinity, where nearly thousands of spacecraft, comprising many from India, orbit.

"The most spectacular manifestations from solar eruptions include northern lights, being direct evidence that solar particles from Sun are travelling to Earth," the expert clarifies.

"But they can also make all the electronics on a satellite malfunction, disable electrical networks and disrupt weather and communication satellites."

Historical Solar Incidents

• The strongest solar event ever recorded occurred during the 1859 solar superstorm which knocked out communication systems worldwide
• During 1989, a part of Canadian electrical network was knocked out, affecting six million people in darkness for hours
• During late 2015, solar activity disrupted flight operations, leading to chaos across Scandinavia and some other European airports
• Recently in 2022, a CME had led to 38 commercial satellites failing

With capability to observe events on the Sun's corona and spot a solar storm or solar eruption as it happens, record its temperature at the source and watch its path, this serves as a forewarning to switch off electrical systems and spacecraft redirecting them out of harm's way.

The Mission's Special Capability

While other space observatories watching the Sun, India's spacecraft has an advantage over others when it comes to studying the solar atmosphere.

"Aditya-L1's coronagraph is the exact size that lets it effectively simulate lunar coverage, completely blocking the solar disk and allowing it continuous observation of nearly the entire of the corona 24 hours a day, throughout the year, including during solar events," says the researcher.

Essentially, this instrument functions as a synthetic eclipse, obscuring the solar glare allowing scientists continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – a feat natural eclipses does only during eclipses.

Moreover, it's unique that can study eruptions in visible light, enabling it to measure a CME's temperature and heat energy – key clues indicating how strong of an eruption when traveling our direction.

Readiness for Peak Period

In preparation for next year's peak solar activity period, scientists collaborated analyzing the data gathered from one of the largest solar eruption recorded by the mission has recorded until now.

This event began on 13 September 2024 during early hours. The eruption's weight totaled billions of tons – for comparison that sank Titanic weighed much less.

At origin, the heat was 1.8 million degrees Celsius and the energy content was equivalent to 2.2 million megatons of TNT – relative to nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 15 kilotons and 21 kilotons respectively.

Although these figures make it sound massive, the scientist describes it as a moderate event.

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

"In my view the CME we evaluated to have occurred when the Sun was in the normal activity phase. Now this sets the benchmark for future comparison to evaluate what to expect when the maximum activity cycle occurs," he says.

"The insights from this will assist in work out protective measures to be adopted safeguarding satellites in orbit. They will also help achieving a better understanding of near-Earth space," he adds.