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

This marks the initial occasion the spacecraft – that entered into space recently – can observe the Sun during its maximum activity cycle.

According to scientific data, it comes roughly every 11 years when the Sun's polarity reverses – the Earth equivalent could be the North and South poles swapping positions.

It's a time of great turbulence. It sees the Sun transition from calm to stormy and features a huge increase in the frequency of solar storms and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – massive bubbles of fire that erupt of the Sun's outermost layer.

Made up of charged particles, a coronal mass ejection can weigh of billions of tons and can attain velocities of up to 3,000km per second. It can travel toward various directions, including towards the Earth. At top speed, the journey takes an ejection about half a day to traverse the vast distance Earth-Sun distance.

"In the normal or quiet periods, the Sun launches a few solar eruptions daily," explains a leading scientist. "In 2026, we expect them to be over ten each day."

Studying coronal mass ejections ranks among the key scientific objectives for the Indian maiden solar mission. One, as these eruptions provide an opportunity to learn about the Sun at the centre of our solar system, and two, since events occurring on the solar surface threaten infrastructure on our planet and in space.

Effects on Our Planet and Space Infrastructure

CMEs seldom present a direct threat to people, but they do affect life on Earth by causing geomagnetic storms that impact the weather in near space, where about thousands of spacecraft, including Indian satellites, orbit.

"The most beautiful displays of a CME are auroras, being direct evidence that charged particles from our star journey toward our planet," the expert explains.

"However, they may make all the electronics on a satellite fail, knock down electrical networks and disrupt meteorological and telecom spacecraft."

Past Solar Events

• The strongest solar storm in history was the 1859 solar superstorm that disabled communication systems worldwide
• During 1989, sections of Quebec's power grid failed, leaving millions in darkness for hours
• In November 2015, solar storms disturbed flight operations, leading to chaos in Sweden and various European air hubs
• In February 2022, an ejection had led to 38 commercial satellites being lost

If we are able to see events on the Sun's corona and detect a solar storm or solar eruption in real time, measure its heat at the source and track its trajectory, it can work as a forewarning to shut down electrical systems and spacecraft and move them out of harm's way.

Aditya-L1's Unique Advantage

There are other space observatories watching the Sun, India's spacecraft has an advantage over others when it comes to watching the corona.

"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 nearly the entire of the corona 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, even during solar events," notes the researcher.

In other words, the coronagraph acts like an artificial Moon, obscuring the Sun's bright surface allowing researchers continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – a feat the real Moon provide only during eclipses.

Moreover, it's unique that can study solar events in visible light, letting it measure eruption heat and heat energy – crucial data indicating the intensity a CME would be when traveling toward Earth.

Preparation for Maximum Activity

In preparation for the upcoming solar maximum, researchers worked together to study the data gathered from one of the largest solar eruption recorded by the mission has recorded until now.

This event began in September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. Its mass was 270 million tonnes – the iceberg that sank Titanic was 1.5 million tonnes.

Initially, its temperature reached extreme levels and the energy content comparable to 2.2 million megatons of explosives – in comparison nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 15 kilotons and 21 kilotons each.

Even though these figures make it sound massive, the expert classifies it as a moderate event.

The asteroid that eliminated the dinosaurs on our planet carried enormous energy and when solar peak occurs, there may be CMEs with energy content equal to even more than that.

"I consider the CME we analyzed to have occurred when the Sun was in the normal activity phase. This establishes the benchmark that we'll be using assessing what is in store during solar maximum arrives," he says.

"The insights from this will assist in work out protective measures to be adopted safeguarding satellites in near space. Additionally, they'll aid us gain a better understanding of our space environment," he concludes.