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

This marks the initial occasion the observatory – that entered into space last year – can observe our star during the peak of its solar cycle.

As per scientific data, this occurs roughly every 11 years as the Sun's magnetic poles flip – the Earth equivalent would be the North and South poles swapping positions.

It's a time of great turbulence. It involves the Sun transition from calm to stormy and features a huge increase in the frequency of solar eruptions and massive solar flares – enormous clouds of plasma that blow out of the Sun's outermost layer.

Made up of charged particles, a coronal mass ejection may have a mass up to a trillion kilograms and can attain velocities of up to 3,000km each second. It can travel in any direction, including towards our planet. At top speed, the journey takes a CME 15 hours to traverse the 150 million km Earth-Sun distance.

"In the normal or low-activity times, our star launches two to three CMEs daily," says a leading scientist. "In 2026, we expect them to be over ten each day."

Studying coronal mass ejections is one of the key scientific objectives for the Indian maiden solar mission. One, because the ejections provide an opportunity to learn about the star in the center of our planetary system, and two, since events that take place on the solar surface threaten infrastructure on our planet and in orbit.

Effects on Our Planet and Orbital Systems

Coronal mass ejections rarely pose immediate danger to people, but they do affect life on Earth by causing magnetic disturbances affecting the weather in near space, where nearly thousands of spacecraft, including many from India, orbit.

"The most spectacular displays of a CME include northern lights, being a clear example that charged particles from Sun are travelling to Earth," the expert clarifies.

"But they can also cause electronic systems on a satellite malfunction, disable electrical networks and disrupt weather and communication satellites."

Historical Solar Incidents

• The strongest solar storm in history was the 1859 solar superstorm that disabled communication systems across the globe
• During 1989, sections of Canadian electrical network failed, affecting millions in darkness for hours
• During late 2015, solar storms disturbed air traffic control, causing disruption across Scandinavia and some other European air hubs
• Recently in 2022, a CME caused dozens of spacecraft being lost

If we are able to see what happens on the Sun's corona and spot a solar storm or solar eruption in real time, measure its heat at the source and watch its path, it can work as advanced warning to switch off power grids and satellites and move them out of harm's way.

The Mission's Unique Advantage

There are other space observatories observing the Sun, India's spacecraft has an advantage compared to rivals regarding studying the solar atmosphere.

"Aditya-L1's coronagraph has perfect dimensions enabling it to nearly mimic the Moon, fully covering the solar disk and allowing it continuous observation of almost all solar atmosphere around the clock, 365 days a year, even during eclipses and occultations," notes the researcher.

Essentially, the coronagraph functions as an artificial Moon, blocking the solar glare allowing scientists continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – something natural eclipses provide only during specific moments.

Moreover, this is the only mission that can study eruptions in visible light, enabling it to measure eruption heat and heat energy – key clues that show how strong a CME would be if it headed our direction.

Readiness for Peak Period

To prepare for next year's peak solar activity period, researchers collaborated to study information gathered from one of the largest CMEs recorded by the mission has recorded until now.

It originated in September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. The eruption's weight was 270 million tonnes – the iceberg that struck the ship weighed much less.

At origin, the heat reached extreme levels and the energy content comparable to millions of tons of explosives – relative to the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 15 kilotons and 21 kilotons each.

Even though these figures seem incredibly large, the expert 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 with energy content equal to even more than that.

"I consider this eruption we evaluated to have occurred during periods of typical solar activity. This establishes the benchmark for future comparison to evaluate what is in store 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. Additionally, they'll aid us gain deeper knowledge of our space environment," he concludes.