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Regarding Aditya-L1, the year 2026 is expected to be like no other.

It's the first time the spacecraft – which was placed into space recently – can watch the Sun when it reaches the peak of its solar cycle.

As per scientific data, this occurs roughly once every 11 years as the Sun's polarity reverses – the Earth equivalent would be the North and South poles changing places.

It's a time of great turbulence. It sees the Sun transition from peaceful to violent and features a significant rise in the number of solar storms and massive solar flares – enormous clouds of fire that erupt from the solar corona.

Made up of charged particles, a CME can weigh of billions of tons and reach velocities of up to 3,000km each second. It can travel toward various directions, even toward our planet. At top speed, the journey takes an ejection 15 hours to cover the vast distance between Earth and the Sun.

"In the normal or quiet periods, our star launches two to three CMEs daily," says an astrophysics expert. "In 2026, it's anticipated there will be 10 or more daily."

Researching CMEs ranks among the most important scientific objectives of India's maiden solar mission. One, as these eruptions offer a chance to study the star in the center of our planetary system, and two, since events occurring on the Sun threaten infrastructure on our planet and in orbit.

Effects on Earth and Orbital Systems

CMEs seldom present immediate danger to human life, but they do affect our planet by causing magnetic disturbances that impact the weather in Earth's vicinity, where about 11,000 satellites, including many from India, are stationed.

"The most beautiful displays from solar eruptions are auroras, which are a clear example that solar particles from our star are travelling toward our planet," the scientist explains.

"But they can also make all the electronics on a satellite malfunction, disable power grids and disrupt meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Past Solar Events

• The strongest solar storm ever recorded occurred during the Carrington Event that disabled telegraph lines across the globe
• In 1989, a part of Quebec's power grid was knocked out, affecting six million people in darkness for hours
• During late 2015, solar storms disturbed flight operations, leading to disruption across Scandinavia and some other European air hubs
• In February 2022, an ejection caused dozens of spacecraft failing

With capability to see what happens on the Sun's corona and detect solar activity or solar eruption as it happens, record its temperature at origin and track its path, it can work as a forewarning to shut down electrical systems and satellites and move them out of harm's way.

Aditya-L1's Unique Advantage

While other space observatories watching our star, Aditya-L1 has an advantage over others regarding studying the solar atmosphere.

"Aditya-L1's coronagraph is the exact size that lets it effectively simulate the Moon, completely blocking the solar disk permitting an uninterrupted view of almost all of the corona 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, even during eclipses and occultations," notes the researcher.

Essentially, the coronagraph functions as an artificial Moon, obscuring the Sun's bright surface allowing scientists constantly study the dim solar atmosphere – something the real Moon provide only during eclipses.

Moreover, it's unique capable of examining solar events using optical wavelengths, enabling it to determine a CME's temperature and heat energy – crucial data indicating the intensity of an eruption if it headed toward Earth.

Readiness for Maximum Activity

In preparation for the upcoming peak solar activity period, researchers worked together to study the data obtained from a major solar eruption recorded by the mission has recorded until now.

It originated on 13 September 2024 during early hours. Its mass totaled billions of tons – for comparison that sank Titanic was 1.5 million tonnes.

Initially, its temperature reached extreme levels and the energy content was equivalent to 2.2 million megatons of TNT – relative to the atomic bombs used in Japan were much smaller and 21 kilotons respectively.

Although the numbers seem massive, the scientist describes it as a "medium-sized" one.

The space rock which wiped out the dinosaurs on Earth carried enormous energy and during the Sun's maximum activity cycle, there may be CMEs with energy content matching even more than that.

"I consider the CME we analyzed to have occurred when the Sun of typical solar activity. Now this sets the standard that we'll be using assessing what is in store when the maximum activity cycle occurs," he says.

"The insights gained will assist in work out protective measures to implement to protect spacecraft in orbit. Additionally, they'll aid achieving deeper knowledge of our space environment," he adds.