🔗 Share this article

For India's first solar observatory, the year 2026 will be like no other.

It's the first time the spacecraft – that entered into space recently – will be able to observe the Sun when it reaches its maximum activity cycle.

As per research, it comes approximately once every 11 years when the Sun's polarity reverses – a similar Earth scenario could be the North and South poles swapping positions.

It's a time of great turbulence. It sees the Sun changing from peaceful to violent and is marked by a huge increase in the number of solar storms and massive solar flares – massive bubbles of plasma that blow out from the solar corona.

Composed of ionized particles, a CME can weigh of billions of tons and reach velocities of up to 3,000km each second. It can head out in any direction, even toward our planet. At maximum velocity, the journey takes a CME about half a day to traverse the 150 million km between Earth and the Sun.

"During typical or quiet periods, the Sun launches two to three CMEs daily," says a leading scientist. "Next year, it's anticipated them to be over ten each day."

Researching coronal mass ejections is one of the most important scientific objectives of India's maiden solar mission. One, because the ejections provide an opportunity to study the star in the center of our planetary system, and secondly, since events that take place on the Sun endanger infrastructure on our planet and in orbit.

Impacts on Our Planet and Space Infrastructure

Coronal mass ejections seldom present a direct threat to human life, but they do affect life on Earth through generating geomagnetic storms that impact the weather in near space, where nearly 11,000 satellites, including Indian satellites, orbit.

"The most spectacular manifestations from solar eruptions include northern lights, being a clear example that charged particles from Sun journey to Earth," the scientist explains.

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

Historical Solar Incidents

• The most powerful solar storm in history occurred during the 1859 solar superstorm which knocked out communication systems worldwide
• In 1989, a part of Quebec's power grid was knocked out, leaving millions in darkness for hours
• During late 2015, solar storms disrupted flight operations, causing chaos in Sweden and some other European airports
• Recently in 2022, a CME caused dozens of spacecraft being lost

With capability to observe what happens in the solar atmosphere and detect a solar storm or solar eruption as it happens, measure its heat at the source and watch its trajectory, this serves as a forewarning to switch off electrical systems and satellites redirecting them out of harm's way.

The Mission's Special Capability

There are other solar missions observing our star, India's spacecraft has an advantage compared to rivals when it comes to studying the solar atmosphere.

"Aditya-L1's coronagraph is the exact size that lets it nearly mimic lunar coverage, fully covering the solar disk permitting an uninterrupted view of nearly the entire of the corona around the clock, 365 days a year, even during solar events," says the researcher.

In other words, this instrument functions as a synthetic eclipse, obscuring the solar glare to let scientists continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – a feat the real Moon does only during specific moments.

Moreover, this is the only mission capable of examining eruptions using optical wavelengths, enabling it to measure eruption heat and heat energy – crucial data that show the intensity of an eruption if it headed toward Earth.

Preparation for Peak Period

To prepare for next year's peak solar activity period, researchers worked together analyzing information obtained from one of the largest solar eruption that Aditya-L1 has recorded until now.

It originated in September 2024 during early hours. The eruption's weight was 270 million tonnes – for comparison that struck the ship weighed much less.

At origin, the heat was 1.8 million degrees Celsius and the energy content was equivalent to millions of tons of TNT – in comparison nuclear weapons used in Japan were 15 kilotons and 21 kilotons each.

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

The asteroid which wiped out prehistoric life on our planet carried enormous energy and when solar peak occurs, there may be CMEs carrying power equal to greater levels.

"In my view the CME we evaluated happened when the Sun of typical solar activity. This establishes the standard that we'll be using to evaluate what to expect when the maximum activity cycle occurs," he says.

"The learnings from this will help us developing the countermeasures to implement to protect satellites in orbit. They will also help us gain a better understanding of near-Earth space," he adds.