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Regarding Aditya-L1, the year 2026 will be like no other.

It's the first time the spacecraft – which was placed in orbit recently – can observe our star during its maximum activity cycle.

As per scientific data, it comes roughly once every 11 years as the Sun's polarity reverses – the Earth equivalent could be the planet's poles changing places.

It's a time marked by intense activity. It involves our star changing from calm to stormy and is marked by a huge increase in the frequency of solar storms 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 reach velocities of up to 3,000km each second. It can head out toward various directions, including towards our planet. At maximum velocity, the journey takes a CME 15 hours to cover the vast distance between Earth and the Sun.

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

Studying CMEs ranks among the most important scientific objectives of India's maiden solar mission. Firstly, as these eruptions offer a chance to learn about the Sun in the center of our planetary system, and secondly, since events that take place on the Sun endanger infrastructure on our planet and in space.

Effects on Our Planet and Orbital Systems

CMEs rarely pose immediate danger to people, but they do affect our planet by causing magnetic disturbances that impact the weather in Earth's vicinity, where nearly thousands of spacecraft, including Indian satellites, are stationed.

"The most spectacular displays from solar eruptions are auroras, which are a clear example that solar particles from Sun journey toward our planet," the scientist explains.

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

Past Solar Events

• The most powerful solar event in history was the Carrington Event which knocked out telegraph lines worldwide
• During 1989, sections of Quebec's power grid failed, affecting millions without power for hours
• During late 2015, solar storms disrupted flight operations, leading to chaos across Scandinavia and various European airports
• Recently in 2022, a CME had led to dozens of spacecraft being lost

If we are able to observe what happens in the solar atmosphere and detect solar activity or solar eruption in real time, record its temperature at origin and track its trajectory, it can work as a forewarning to switch off electrical systems and spacecraft and move them to safety.

The Mission's Unique Advantage

There are other space observatories observing the Sun, Aditya-L1 holds an edge compared to rivals when it comes to watching the corona.

"Aditya-L1's coronagraph has perfect dimensions enabling it to effectively simulate lunar coverage, completely blocking the Sun's photosphere permitting continuous observation of nearly the entire solar atmosphere 24 hours a day, throughout the year, even during eclipses and occultations," says the researcher.

Essentially, this instrument functions as a synthetic eclipse, obscuring the Sun's bright surface allowing scientists continuously observe its faint outer corona – something the real Moon does only during eclipses.

Moreover, this is the only mission capable of examining solar events using optical wavelengths, letting it determine eruption heat and heat energy – key clues that show how strong a CME would be if it headed our direction.

Preparation for Peak Period

In preparation for next year's peak solar activity period, researchers worked together to study the data obtained from one of the largest CMEs that Aditya-L1 has recorded until now.

This event began on 13 September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. Its mass was 270 million tonnes – the iceberg that struck the ship weighed much less.

Initially, the heat reached extreme levels and the energy content comparable to millions of tons of TNT – relative to nuclear weapons used in Japan were much smaller and 21 kilotons respectively.

Although these figures seem massive, the scientist classifies it as a "medium-sized" one.

The asteroid that eliminated prehistoric life on Earth was 100 million megatons and during solar peak occurs, we could see CMEs carrying power matching even more than that.

"I consider the CME we evaluated to have occurred during periods was in the normal activity phase. This establishes the standard that we'll be using to evaluate what is in store when the maximum activity cycle occurs," he states.

"The learnings from this will assist in developing the countermeasures to be adopted to protect satellites in orbit. They will also help us gain a better understanding of our space environment," he adds.