About Solar Storm:
- A solar storm is a sudden explosion of particles, energy, magnetic fields, and material blasted into the solar system by the Sun.
What Causes a Solar Storm?
- The Sun creates a tangled mess of magnetic fields.
- These magnetic fields get twisted up as the Sun rotates — with its equator rotating faster than its poles.
- Solar storms typically begin when these twisted magnetic fields on the Sun get contorted and stretched so much that they snap and reconnect (in a process called magnetic reconnection), releasing large amounts of energy.
These powerful eruptions can generate any or all of the following:
- a bright flash of light called a solar flare.
- a radiation storm, or flurry of solar particles propelled into space at high speeds.
- an enormous cloud of solar material, called a coronal mass ejection, that billows away from the Sun.
How Does a Solar Storm Affect?
- When directed toward Earth, a solar storm can create a major disturbance in Earth’s magnetic field, called a geomagnetic storm, that can produce effects such as radio blackouts, power outages, and beautiful auroras.
- They do not cause direct harm to anyone on Earth, however, as our planet’s magnetic field and atmosphere protect us from the worst of these storms.
What are Solar Flares?
- A solar flare is an intense burst of radiation, or light, on the Sun.
- These flashes span the electromagnetic spectrum — including X-rays, gamma rays, radio waves, and ultraviolet and visible light.
- Solar flares are the most powerful explosions in the solar system — the biggest ones can have as much energy as a billion hydrogen bombs.
What are Radiation Storms?
- Solar eruptions can accelerate charged particles — electrons and protons — into space at incredibly high speeds, initiating a radiation storm.
What are Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs)?
- A CME is an enormous cloud of electrically charged gas, called plasma, that erupts from the Sun.
- A single CME can blast billions of tons of material into the solar system all at once.
- CMEs occur in the outer atmosphere of the Sun, called the corona, and often look like giant bubbles bursting from the Sun.
Key Facts about Aditya-L1:
- It is the first space-based observatory-class Indian solar mission to study the Sun.
- It was by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).
- The spacecraft is placed in a halo orbit around the Lagrangian point 1 (L1) of the Sun-Earth system.
- A satellite placed in the halo orbit around the L1 point has the major advantage of continuously viewing the Sun without any occultation/eclipse.
- This provides a greater advantage of observing the solar activities continuously.
- The spacecraft is carrying seven payloads to observe the photosphere, chromosphere, and outermost layers of the Sun using electromagnetic and particle detectors.
