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Regarding Aditya-L1, the year 2026 will be truly unique.

This marks the initial occasion the spacecraft – that entered into space recently – will be able to observe the Sun when it reaches its maximum activity cycle.

As per scientific data, it comes roughly every 11 years when the Sun's polarity reverses – a similar Earth scenario could 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 features a huge increase in the number of solar eruptions and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – massive bubbles of plasma that blow out from the solar corona.

Composed of charged particles, a coronal mass ejection may have a mass up to a trillion kilograms and reach velocities of up to 3,000km each second. It can travel in any direction, even toward our planet. At maximum velocity, the journey takes an ejection about half a day to cover the vast distance between Earth and the Sun.

"During typical or low-activity times, the Sun launches a few solar eruptions a day," explains a leading scientist. "Next year, we expect there will be over ten each day."

Studying coronal mass ejections ranks among the key scientific objectives for the Indian first solar observatory. One, as these eruptions offer a chance to study the star in the center of our planetary system, and two, since events that take place on the solar surface endanger infrastructure on our planet and in space.

Effects on Our Planet and Space Infrastructure

Coronal mass ejections seldom present immediate danger to human life, yet they impact our planet through generating geomagnetic storms affecting the weather in near space, where about thousands of spacecraft, comprising many from India, are stationed.

"The most beautiful manifestations of a CME are auroras, being a clear example that solar particles from Sun journey toward our planet," the scientist explains.

"But they can also make all the electronics aboard spacecraft malfunction, knock down power grids and affect meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Past Solar Incidents

• The most powerful solar storm in history was the Carrington Event which knocked out communication systems across the globe
• During 1989, sections of Quebec's power grid failed, affecting six million people without power for hours
• In November 2015, solar storms disrupted air traffic control, leading to disruption across Scandinavia and various European airports
• Recently in 2022, an ejection caused 38 commercial satellites failing

With capability to see what happens in the solar atmosphere and spot solar activity or solar eruption as it happens, record its temperature at origin and track its trajectory, it can work as a forewarning to switch off electrical systems and satellites 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 over others when it comes to studying the solar atmosphere.

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

Essentially, this instrument acts like an artificial Moon, obscuring the solar glare allowing researchers constantly study the dim solar atmosphere – a feat the real Moon does only during eclipses.

Additionally, this is the only mission that can study eruptions using optical wavelengths, enabling it to determine eruption heat and thermal output – crucial data indicating how strong a CME would be if it headed toward Earth.

Readiness for Maximum Activity

To prepare for next year's solar maximum, researchers collaborated to study 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 at 00:30 GMT. Its mass totaled billions of tons – for comparison that struck the ship was 1.5 million tonnes.

At origin, the heat was 1.8 million degrees Celsius and the energy content comparable to 2.2 million megatons of TNT – relative to the atomic bombs used in Japan were 15 kilotons in scale respectively.

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

The asteroid which wiped out prehistoric life on Earth carried enormous energy and when solar peak occurs, we could see eruptions carrying power matching even more than that.

"I consider this eruption we analyzed happened during periods of typical solar activity. This establishes the standard that we'll be using assessing what to expect during solar maximum arrives," he states.

"The learnings gained will help us work out the countermeasures to implement safeguarding spacecraft in near space. They will also help us gain deeper knowledge of near-Earth space," he concludes.