🔗 Share this article

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

It's the first time the spacecraft – which was placed into space recently – will be able to watch our star during its maximum activity cycle.

As per research, it comes roughly once every 11 years as the Sun's magnetic poles flip – a similar Earth scenario would be the planet's poles changing places.

It's a time of great turbulence. It sees the Sun changing from peaceful to violent and features a significant rise in the frequency of solar eruptions and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – enormous clouds of plasma that blow out of the Sun's outermost layer.

Made up of ionized particles, a coronal mass ejection may have a mass up to a trillion kilograms and can attain velocities exceeding 2,000 miles each second. It can travel in any direction, including towards our planet. At top speed, it would take an ejection about half a day to cover the 150 million km Earth-Sun distance.

"During typical or low-activity times, the Sun emits two to three CMEs daily," explains a leading scientist. "In 2026, we expect them to be over ten each day."

Studying coronal mass ejections ranks among the most important scientific objectives of India's maiden solar mission. Firstly, because the ejections offer a chance to learn about the Sun at the centre of our solar system, and two, because activities occurring on the solar surface threaten systems on our planet and in orbit.

Impacts on Earth and Orbital Systems

Coronal mass ejections seldom present a direct threat to human life, 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, orbit.

"The most spectacular displays from solar eruptions include northern lights, which are a clear example that solar particles from Sun journey to Earth," the expert explains.

"However, they may make all the electronics on a satellite malfunction, knock down electrical networks and disrupt weather and communication satellites."

Historical Solar Incidents

• The most powerful solar storm in history occurred during the 1859 solar superstorm which knocked out communication systems worldwide
• During 1989, a part of Canadian electrical network was knocked out, leaving millions without power for hours
• During late 2015, solar activity disturbed flight operations, causing disruption in Sweden and some other European air hubs
• In February 2022, an ejection caused 38 commercial satellites failing

With capability to observe what happens in the solar atmosphere and detect solar activity or a coronal mass ejection as it happens, measure its heat at origin and track its path, it can work as advanced warning to shut down power grids and spacecraft and move them to safety.

The Mission's Unique Advantage

While other space observatories observing the Sun, Aditya-L1 has an advantage over others when it comes to studying the solar atmosphere.

"The instrument has perfect dimensions that lets it nearly mimic lunar coverage, fully covering the solar disk permitting continuous observation of almost all of the corona around the clock, 365 days a year, including during solar events," says the researcher.

Essentially, the coronagraph functions as an artificial Moon, blocking the solar glare to let scientists constantly study the dim solar atmosphere – something natural eclipses provide only during eclipses.

Moreover, this is the only mission that can study solar events in visible light, letting it determine eruption heat and heat energy – key clues indicating the intensity of an eruption when traveling our direction.

Readiness for Maximum Activity

In preparation for next year's peak solar activity period, researchers worked together analyzing the data obtained from a major CMEs recorded by the mission has recorded until now.

It originated on 13 September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. The eruption's weight was 270 million tonnes – the iceberg that sank Titanic was 1.5 million tonnes.

Initially, the heat reached extreme levels and the energy content was equivalent to millions of tons of explosives – in comparison nuclear weapons used in Japan were much smaller in scale each.

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

The asteroid which wiped out prehistoric life on Earth carried enormous energy and when the Sun's maximum activity cycle, there may be eruptions with energy content equal to even more than that.

"In my view the CME we analyzed to have occurred during periods was in the normal activity phase. This establishes the benchmark that we'll be using assessing what is in store when the maximum activity cycle arrives," he states.

"The insights gained will assist in work out protective measures to implement to protect spacecraft in near space. They will also help us gain a better understanding of our space environment," he adds.