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Regarding Aditya-L1, the year 2026 will be truly unique.

It's the first time the spacecraft – which was placed in orbit last year – will be able to observe our star when it reaches the peak of its solar cycle.

According to scientific data, it comes approximately once every 11 years as the Sun's magnetic poles flip – the Earth equivalent would be the North and South poles changing places.

This period marked by intense activity. It involves the Sun changing from peaceful to violent and is marked by a significant rise in the number of solar eruptions and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – massive bubbles of plasma 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 exceeding 2,000 miles per second. It can travel in any direction, including towards our planet. At top speed, it would take an ejection about half a day to traverse the 150 million km between Earth and the Sun.

"In the normal or low-activity times, the Sun launches two to three CMEs daily," explains an astrophysics expert. "In 2026, it's anticipated there will be 10 or more daily."

Studying coronal mass ejections is one of the key scientific objectives of India's first solar observatory. Firstly, as these eruptions offer a chance to study the Sun at the centre of our solar system, and secondly, because activities occurring on the Sun threaten systems on our planet and in space.

Impacts on Our Planet and Orbital Systems

Coronal mass ejections rarely pose a direct threat to people, but they do affect our planet through generating magnetic disturbances that impact the weather in Earth's vicinity, where nearly 11,000 satellites, comprising Indian satellites, are stationed.

"The most beautiful manifestations of a CME are auroras, being a clear example that solar particles from our star are travelling to Earth," the expert clarifies.

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

Past Solar Events

• The strongest solar event in history occurred during the Carrington Event which knocked out telegraph lines worldwide
• In 1989, sections of Quebec's power grid failed, affecting six million people without power for hours
• During late 2015, solar storms disturbed flight operations, leading to chaos across Scandinavia and various European air hubs
• Recently in 2022, an ejection had led to dozens of spacecraft failing

With capability to observe events on the Sun's corona and spot solar activity or solar eruption in real time, measure its heat at origin and watch its path, this serves as a forewarning to shut down electrical systems and spacecraft and move them out of harm's way.

Aditya-L1's Special Capability

While other space observatories watching the Sun, Aditya-L1 holds an edge over others when it comes to watching the corona.

"Aditya-L1's coronagraph is the exact size that lets it effectively simulate the Moon, fully covering the Sun's photosphere and allowing it an uninterrupted view of nearly the entire solar atmosphere around the clock, 365 days a year, including during eclipses and occultations," says the expert.

Essentially, the coronagraph functions as a synthetic eclipse, obscuring the Sun's bright surface allowing scientists continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – a feat natural eclipses does only during specific moments.

Additionally, it's unique capable of examining solar events in visible light, letting it measure a CME's temperature and thermal output – crucial data indicating how strong a CME would be when traveling toward Earth.

Preparation for Maximum Activity

To prepare for next year's solar maximum, scientists worked together analyzing the data obtained from a major CMEs recorded by the mission has recorded until now.

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

Initially, its temperature was 1.8 million degrees Celsius and the energy content comparable to 2.2 million megatons of explosives – relative to the atomic bombs used in Japan were much smaller and 21 kilotons each.

Even though the numbers make it sound incredibly large, the scientist classifies it as a "medium-sized" one.

The asteroid that eliminated the dinosaurs on our planet was 100 million megatons and when the Sun's maximum activity cycle, we could see CMEs carrying power matching greater levels.

"In my view this eruption we analyzed to have occurred when the Sun was in the normal activity phase. This establishes the standard for future comparison to evaluate what to expect during solar maximum arrives," he states.

"The learnings from this will assist in developing the countermeasures to be adopted safeguarding spacecraft in orbit. Additionally, they'll aid achieving deeper knowledge of near-Earth space," he adds.