Why the Year 2026 Is Set to Be an Unprecedented Year for the Indian Sun Mission

For India's first solar observatory, the year 2026 is expected to be truly unique.

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 scientific data, it comes approximately once every 11 years when the Sun's polarity reverses – a similar Earth scenario could be the planet's poles swapping positions.

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

Made up of charged particles, a coronal mass ejection can weigh up to a trillion kilograms and can attain a speed exceeding 2,000 miles each second. It can travel in any direction, even toward the Earth. At top speed, the journey takes a CME about half a day to cover the vast distance between Earth and the Sun.

"In the normal or low-activity times, our star emits two to three CMEs daily," explains a leading scientist. "In 2026, we expect there will be over ten each day."

Researching coronal mass ejections is one of the key research goals for the Indian maiden solar mission. Firstly, because the ejections provide an opportunity to learn about the Sun at the centre of our solar system, and secondly, because activities that take place on the Sun endanger infrastructure on Earth and in space.

Effects on Earth and Space Infrastructure

CMEs rarely pose a direct threat to human life, but they do affect our planet by causing magnetic disturbances that impact the weather in near space, where nearly thousands of spacecraft, comprising Indian satellites, orbit.

"The most beautiful displays from solar eruptions are auroras, being a clear example that charged particles from our star are travelling to Earth," the expert explains.

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

Past Solar Incidents

• The strongest solar event in history occurred during the Carrington Event which knocked out telegraph lines across the globe
• During 1989, a part of Quebec's power grid failed, affecting millions in darkness for nine hours
• During late 2015, solar storms disturbed flight operations, causing disruption in Sweden and some other European airports
• Recently in 2022, a CME caused 38 commercial satellites being lost

With capability to observe events on the Sun's corona and spot solar activity or solar eruption as it happens, record its temperature at the source and track its trajectory, it can work as a forewarning to switch off power grids and spacecraft and move them to safety.

The Mission's Unique Advantage

There are other space observatories observing the Sun, India's spacecraft holds an edge compared to rivals when it comes to watching the corona.

"The instrument has perfect dimensions that lets it nearly mimic the Moon, completely blocking the solar disk and allowing it continuous observation of almost all of the corona around the clock, 365 days a year, including during solar events," says the researcher.

In other words, the coronagraph functions as a synthetic eclipse, obscuring the solar glare to let researchers continuously observe the dim solar atmosphere – something the real Moon provide only during eclipses.

Additionally, it's unique that can study eruptions using optical wavelengths, enabling it to determine a CME's temperature and thermal output – crucial data that show the intensity of an eruption when traveling our direction.

Preparation for Maximum Activity

In preparation for next year's solar maximum, researchers worked together to study information gathered from one of the largest CMEs that Aditya-L1 has recorded until now.

It originated in September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. The eruption's weight totaled billions of tons – the iceberg that struck the ship was 1.5 million tonnes.

Initially, its temperature was 1.8 million degrees Celsius and the energy content was equivalent to 2.2 million megatons of TNT – relative to nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were much smaller and 21 kilotons respectively.

Even though these figures make it sound incredibly large, the scientist describes it as a "medium-sized" one.

The space rock that eliminated the dinosaurs on Earth carried enormous energy and when the Sun's maximum activity cycle, we could see CMEs with energy content equal to even more than that.

"I consider the CME we analyzed happened during periods of typical solar activity. Now this sets the standard that we'll be using assessing what to expect when the maximum activity cycle arrives," he states.

"The insights from this will assist in developing protective measures to implement safeguarding satellites in near space. Additionally, they'll aid achieving deeper knowledge of near-Earth space," he adds.