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

It's the first time the spacecraft – that entered in orbit last year – can watch the Sun during its maximum activity cycle.

As per research, it comes roughly once every 11 years as the Sun's polarity reverses – the Earth equivalent would be the North and South poles swapping positions.

This period marked by intense activity. It sees our star transition from peaceful to violent and features a huge increase in the frequency of solar storms and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – massive bubbles of plasma that erupt from the solar corona.

Made up of charged particles, a CME can weigh of billions of tons and reach a speed of up to 3,000km each second. It can head out toward various directions, including towards the Earth. At top speed, the journey takes a CME about half a day to traverse the vast distance Earth-Sun distance.

"In the normal or low-activity times, our star launches two to three CMEs daily," says a leading scientist. "Next year, it's anticipated them to be over ten daily."

Researching CMEs ranks among the key scientific objectives of India's first solar observatory. One, as these eruptions provide an opportunity to learn about the star at the centre of our solar system, and secondly, because activities occurring on the solar surface threaten systems on our planet and in space.

Effects on Our Planet and Space Infrastructure

CMEs seldom present immediate danger to people, but they do affect our planet by causing geomagnetic storms affecting conditions in Earth's vicinity, where nearly 11,000 satellites, comprising many from India, are stationed.

"The most beautiful displays of a CME include northern lights, which are a clear example that charged particles from our star are travelling toward our planet," the expert explains.

"But they can also cause electronic systems on a satellite fail, disable electrical networks and affect meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Historical Solar Events

• The strongest solar event in history occurred during the Carrington Event that disabled telegraph lines worldwide
• In 1989, a part of Canadian electrical network failed, affecting millions without power for hours
• In November 2015, solar activity disrupted flight operations, leading to disruption across Scandinavia and some other European airports
• Recently in 2022, a CME caused 38 commercial satellites being lost

If we are able to observe events in the solar atmosphere and spot solar activity or solar eruption as it happens, measure its heat at the source and watch its path, this serves as advanced warning to shut down electrical systems and spacecraft and move them to safety.

Aditya-L1's Unique Advantage

While other space observatories observing our star, India's spacecraft has an advantage compared to rivals regarding studying the solar atmosphere.

"The instrument has perfect dimensions enabling it to effectively simulate the Moon, fully covering the solar disk and allowing it an uninterrupted view of almost all solar atmosphere around the clock, throughout the year, including during eclipses and occultations," says the researcher.

In other words, the coronagraph functions as a synthetic eclipse, blocking the Sun's bright surface to let researchers constantly study its faint outer corona – something the real Moon provide only during eclipses.

Moreover, this is the only mission capable of examining eruptions using optical wavelengths, enabling it to determine eruption heat and heat energy – crucial data indicating how strong of an eruption when traveling toward Earth.

Readiness for Maximum Activity

In preparation for the upcoming peak solar activity period, researchers worked together to study information gathered from one of the largest solar eruption that Aditya-L1 has observed recently.

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

Initially, its temperature reached extreme levels and the energy content comparable to 2.2 million megatons of explosives – in comparison the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were much smaller and 21 kilotons each.

Even though the numbers seem massive, the expert describes it as a "medium-sized" one.

The asteroid that eliminated the dinosaurs on our planet carried enormous energy and when the Sun's maximum activity cycle, there may be eruptions carrying power equal to greater levels.

"I consider this eruption we analyzed happened during periods was in the normal activity phase. This establishes the benchmark for future comparison assessing what to expect during solar maximum occurs," he states.

"The learnings gained will assist in work out protective measures to be adopted safeguarding satellites in orbit. They will also help us gain deeper knowledge of our space environment," he concludes.