According to a new study, solar activity is expected to peak next year.

Researchers at the Indian Space Science Center at IISER Kolkata have discovered a new relationship between the sun’s magnetic field and the sunspot cycle, which could help predict when peak solar activity will occur, the researchers say . Their study suggests that the maximum intensity of the current sunspot cycle, Solar Cycle 25, is imminent and likely to occur within a year. Our star, the Sun, is made up of hot ionized gas called plasma.

Huge plasma currents and convection work together to create a magnetic field inside the Sun, which appears as dark spots on the surface. These sunspots are about the size of Earth and are powerful magnetic sites that are about 10,000 times stronger than Earth’s magnetic field. Sometimes, a sunspot’s magnetic field is disrupted by violent events, leading to the formation of solar magnetic storms such as flares and coronal mass ejections.

These storms emit high-energy radiation and send large amounts of magnetized plasma into space. The strongest of these storms can cause significant damage to orbiting satellites, power grids, and communications equipment as they head toward Earth. Centuries of observations since the early 16th century have shown that the number of sunspots observed on the Sun fluctuates periodically.

Approximately every 11 years, the number of sunspots and the intensity of solar activity reach a peak, and the most severe disruption to the planet’s space environment, or space weather, is expected. However, predicting when this peak will occur remains a challenge. The solar cycle is generated by a dynamo mechanism powered by energy from plasma streams inside the Sun.

Find IFSC code:  https://arthvarta.com/ifsc-code-find-m…ll-bank-branches/ ‎

Two major components of the solar magnetic field are thought to be involved in this dynamo mechanism. One appears in sunspot cycles and the other in the recycling of the Sun’s large-scale dipole field. The latter is very similar to the Earth’s magnetic field and extends from one pole of the Sun to the other. As the sunspots cycle, the strength of the Sun’s dipole field is also observed to increase or decrease, and the north and south magnetic poles also alternate every 11 years. In 1935, Swiss astronomer Max Waldmeyer discovered that the faster a sunspot cycle increases, the stronger it becomes, and that stronger cycles take less time to reach their maximum intensity.

This relationship has often been used to predict the strength of sunspot cycles based on observations early in their appearance. The discovery complements the Waldmeyer effect by linking the Sun’s two main magnetic field components, supporting the theory that sunspot development is not just a symptom, but an important part of how the solar dynamo process works. Masu.

It is possible to predict when the current cycle will peak by combining observations of sunspots with these new measurements of the rate at which the sun’s dipole magnetic field is decreasing. With an uncertainty range of September 2024, the analysis indicates that the peak of solar cycle 25 is most likely to happen in early 2024.

The timing of solar cycle peaks, when the strongest activity and most frequent space weather disturbances are anticipated, can now be predicted thanks to this most recent discovery.