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

It's the first time the observatory – that entered into space last year – will be able to watch the Sun during the peak of its solar cycle.

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

It's a time marked by intense activity. It sees the Sun changing from peaceful to violent and is marked by a huge increase in the frequency of solar storms and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – enormous clouds of plasma that erupt from the solar corona.

Made up of ionized particles, a CME may have a mass up to a trillion kilograms and reach a speed exceeding 2,000 miles each second. It can head out in any direction, even toward our planet. At top speed, it would take an ejection about half a day to cover the vast distance Earth-Sun distance.

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

Researching coronal mass ejections is one of the key research goals of India's maiden solar mission. One, as these eruptions provide an opportunity to study the star in the center of our solar system, and secondly, since events occurring on the Sun endanger infrastructure on Earth and in space.

Impacts on Earth and Orbital Systems

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

"The most beautiful displays of a CME include northern lights, being direct evidence that charged particles from Sun journey to Earth," the expert clarifies.

"But they can also make all the electronics aboard spacecraft fail, knock down power grids and disrupt weather and communication satellites."

Past Solar Events

• The strongest solar event ever recorded was the Carrington Event that disabled communication systems worldwide
• During 1989, a part of Canadian electrical network failed, leaving millions without power for nine hours
• In November 2015, solar storms disturbed air traffic control, leading to disruption in Sweden and some other European airports
• In February 2022, a CME caused dozens of spacecraft failing

With capability to see events in the solar atmosphere and detect solar activity or a coronal mass ejection in real time, measure its heat at the source and track its trajectory, it can work as a forewarning to shut down power grids and spacecraft redirecting them out of harm's way.

Aditya-L1's Special Capability

There are other space observatories watching our star, India's spacecraft holds an edge compared to rivals when it comes to studying the solar atmosphere.

"The instrument is the exact size that lets it effectively simulate the Moon, completely blocking the Sun's photosphere and allowing it an uninterrupted view of nearly the entire solar atmosphere 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, even during solar events," notes the expert.

In other words, this instrument acts like an artificial Moon, obscuring the solar glare allowing researchers continuously observe its faint outer corona – something natural eclipses provide only during eclipses.

Moreover, this is the only mission that can study eruptions in visible light, letting it measure a CME's temperature and heat energy – key clues indicating the intensity a CME would be if it headed our direction.

Readiness for Peak Period

In preparation for next year's solar maximum, researchers collaborated analyzing information obtained from one of the largest solar eruption that Aditya-L1 has recorded until now.

This event began in September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. The eruption's weight was 270 million tonnes – for comparison that struck the ship 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 nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 15 kilotons and 21 kilotons respectively.

Although these figures make it sound incredibly large, the scientist classifies it as a "medium-sized" one.

The space rock that eliminated prehistoric life on Earth was 100 million megatons and during solar peak occurs, we could see CMEs carrying power equal to greater levels.

"I consider this eruption we evaluated to have occurred when the Sun was in the normal activity phase. Now this sets the benchmark that we'll be using assessing what to expect when the maximum activity cycle occurs," he states.

"The learnings gained will help us work out the countermeasures to implement safeguarding spacecraft in orbit. They will also help us gain deeper knowledge of our space environment," he adds.