Why 2026 Is Set to Be a Year Like No Other for India's Sun Mission

Regarding Aditya-L1, the year 2026 is expected to be truly unique.

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

As per scientific data, it comes roughly every 11 years as the Sun's polarity reverses – a similar Earth scenario would be the planet's poles swapping positions.

This period of great turbulence. It involves the Sun changing from peaceful to violent and is marked by a huge increase in the number of solar eruptions and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) – massive bubbles of plasma that erupt of the Sun's outermost layer.

Composed of ionized particles, a CME can weigh of billions of tons and reach a speed exceeding 2,000 miles each second. It can travel in any direction, even toward the Earth. At maximum velocity, it would take an ejection 15 hours to traverse the vast distance between Earth and the Sun.

"During typical or low-activity times, the Sun emits a few solar eruptions daily," says a leading scientist. "Next year, it's anticipated there will be 10 or more daily."

Studying coronal mass ejections is one of the key research goals 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 two, since events that take place on the Sun endanger infrastructure on our planet and in space.

Impacts on Earth and Orbital Systems

CMEs rarely pose immediate danger to human life, but they do affect life on Earth through generating geomagnetic storms that impact the weather in near space, where about 11,000 satellites, including Indian satellites, are stationed.

"The most beautiful manifestations of a CME include northern lights, being direct evidence that solar particles from Sun journey toward our planet," the scientist clarifies.

"But they can also cause electronic systems on a satellite fail, knock down electrical networks and disrupt weather and communication satellites."

Past Solar Events

• The strongest solar event in history occurred during the Carrington Event that disabled telegraph lines worldwide
• During 1989, sections of Quebec's power grid failed, affecting millions in darkness for nine hours
• In November 2015, solar activity disrupted air traffic control, leading to disruption across Scandinavia and various European air hubs
• Recently in 2022, an ejection had led to 38 commercial satellites failing

If we are able to see what happens in the solar atmosphere and detect a solar storm or a coronal mass ejection in real time, measure its heat at origin and watch its path, this serves as advanced warning to shut down electrical systems and satellites and move them to safety.

The Mission's Unique Advantage

There are other space observatories observing the Sun, Aditya-L1 holds an edge over others regarding watching the corona.

"The instrument is the exact size that lets it nearly mimic the Moon, fully covering the solar disk and allowing it continuous observation of nearly the entire solar atmosphere around the clock, throughout the year, even during solar events," says the expert.

Essentially, this instrument acts like a synthetic eclipse, blocking the solar glare to let scientists constantly study its faint outer corona – something the real Moon provide only during eclipses.

Additionally, this is the only mission capable of examining eruptions using optical wavelengths, enabling it to measure eruption heat and heat energy – key clues indicating how strong a CME would be when traveling toward Earth.

Preparation for Peak Period

To prepare for the upcoming peak solar activity period, researchers collaborated to study the data obtained from a major solar eruption that Aditya-L1 has recorded until now.

It originated on 13 September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. The eruption's weight totaled billions of tons – for comparison that struck the ship weighed much less.

Initially, its temperature reached extreme levels and the energy content was equivalent to 2.2 million megatons of TNT – relative to nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 15 kilotons in scale each.

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

The asteroid which wiped out the dinosaurs on our planet was 100 million megatons and when solar peak occurs, we could see CMEs with energy content matching even more than that.

"I consider the CME we analyzed happened when the Sun was in the normal activity phase. Now this sets the benchmark that we'll be using assessing what is in store during solar maximum occurs," he says.

"The learnings from this will help us developing the countermeasures to implement safeguarding spacecraft in orbit. They will also help us gain deeper knowledge of near-Earth space," he concludes.