Every 11 years, the sun finishes a solar panel of calm and stormy action and starts a new one.
It's important to comprehend the solar panel since space weather resulting from the sun -- eruptions such as solar flares and coronal mass ejection events -- may impact the power grid, satellites, GPS, airlines, rockets and astronauts in space.
And we just got a little more information about the way in which the sun's action could impact us.
The new solar cycle, Solar Cycle 25, formally started in December 2019, according to an announcement by the Solar Cycle 25 Prediction Panel of global experts on Tuesday. It can take as long as 10 months to compute when the cycle starts, because sunlight is indeed changeable, which is why it was announced Tuesday.
Solar Cycle 25 will be very similar to this one we just experienced for the last 11 decades, according to the prediction. The upcoming solar maximum, when the sun is undergoing peak activity, is predicted to occur in July 2025. During that time, it's possible for solar flares or other eruptions for sunlight to disrupt communications on Earth.
Solar Cycle 24 was the fourth smallest cycle on record and the weakest cycle in 100 years, said Lisa Upton, co-chair of Solar Cycle 25 Prediction Panel and solar physicist at the Space Systems Research Corporation, during a press conference Tuesday.
While Solar Cycle 24 was below average, it was not without danger.
It's important to comprehend the solar panel since space weather resulting from the sun -- eruptions such as solar flares and coronal mass ejection events -- may impact the power grid, satellites, GPS, airlines, rockets and astronauts in space.
And we just got a little more information about the way in which the sun's action could impact us.
The new solar cycle, Solar Cycle 25, formally started in December 2019, according to an announcement by the Solar Cycle 25 Prediction Panel of global experts on Tuesday. It can take as long as 10 months to compute when the cycle starts, because sunlight is indeed changeable, which is why it was announced Tuesday.
Solar Cycle 25 will be very similar to this one we just experienced for the last 11 decades, according to the prediction. The upcoming solar maximum, when the sun is undergoing peak activity, is predicted to occur in July 2025. During that time, it's possible for solar flares or other eruptions for sunlight to disrupt communications on Earth.
Solar Cycle 24 was the fourth smallest cycle on record and the weakest cycle in 100 years, said Lisa Upton, co-chair of Solar Cycle 25 Prediction Panel and solar physicist at the Space Systems Research Corporation, during a press conference Tuesday.
While Solar Cycle 24 was below average, it was not without danger.
"Just because it is a below-average solar panel, does not mean there is no risk of extreme space weather," said Doug Biesecker, panel co-chair and solar physicist at NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center, in a statement. "The Sun's effect on our everyday lives is real and is there. (We're ) staffed 24/7, 365 days a year since sunlight is capable of giving us something to predict ."
Biesecker compared it to hurricane period. Even if lots of the storms do not make landfall, the few that do could really matter, which is precisely why space weather forecasts are so important.
Sunspots, which are dark spots on the sun, help scientists track the sun's action. They're the source point for the volatile rhythms and ejection events which release light, solar material and energy into space. About 115 sunspots are predicted for the summit of this new cycle. In contrast, an above-average active cycle would comprise more than 200 sunspots.
"We maintain a detailed record of the couple tiny sunspots that indicate the onset and increase of this new cycle," stated Frédéric Clette, forecast panelist and director for the World Data Center for the Sunspot Index and Long-term Solar Observations at the Royal Observatory of Belgium in Brussels. "These will be the diminutive heralds of prospective giant solar fireworks. It's only by tracking the general tendency over several months which we're able to ascertain the tipping point between two cycles"
The more scientists learn about the solar cycle, the better they can prepare to predict when these events might occur.
Over the course of a solar cycle, the sun will transition from a serene period to a that is very intense and active. This activity is monitored by counting sunspots on the sun and how many are visible as time passes. Afterward, the sun will grow silent again during a solar minimum. And this takes place about every 11 years.
Over the past year and a half, the sun was silent with hardly a sunspot noticeable on its own surface.
The solar minimum happened in December 2019. In this period, the sun is still active, but it's more quiet and contains less sunspots. Ever since then, the sun's activity has gradually increased. The new prediction indicated that the sun's action will peak in July 2025.
A total solar eclipse will cross North America in April 2024, which might afford scientists with the opportunity to discover the sun's activity, like solar eruptions or sunspots, during the occasion.
"We expect an eclipse close to solar maximum will not just show us an amazing corona, but also some large, intriguing sunspots on the surface of the Sun to help us understand about living inside the atmosphere of an energetic star and the distance weather it creates," said Valentin Martinez Pillet, manager of the National Solar Observatory in Colorado, in a statement.
Now that we are past the very least, scientists have predicted the sun's action will increase over the months and years ahead of time as we approach July 2025.
"As we emerge from solar minimum and strategy Cycle 25's greatest, it's important to keep in mind solar activity never stops; it affects form as the pendulum swings," explained Lika Guhathakurta, solar scientist in the Heliophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington, in a statement.
Preparing for the sun's activity
even though the panel obtained the timing of the maximum wrong during the previous cycle, they have improved their methods of forecast, Biesecker said.
"We treated sunlight as one huge ball of gas, but the hemispheres, north and south, act independently," he explained. "During the past solar panel, they had been out of phase with each other more than previously, which ruined our forecast."
But tracking the magnetic fields in the polar areas of sunlight has consistently provided the best forecast, he said.
"There is no bad weather, just bad preparation," said Jake Bleacher, chief scientist for NASA's Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate at the bureau's headquarters, in a declaration. "Space weather is what it's -- our job is to prepare"
Experts said that space weather is transitioning from a focal point of study to a more nationwide operational priority across plenty of agencies, including NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Department of Homeland Security, the Federal Aviation Administration and lots of more.
This allows for improved planning, protection and preparedness from space weather dangers.
The bureau NOAA shares space weather forecasts from the Space Weather Prediction Center in Colorado and contains satellites monitoring space weather in real time. It has a hotline with electric grid operators to frighten them, so that they could prepare and keep the power on, Biesecker said.
And NASA researches the near-Earth area environment, which will help improve forecasting of space weather.
As well as protecting the technology we depend on, space weather forecasts will grow increasingly important for astronauts in space.
The NASA Artemis program expects plans to send people out of low-Earth orbit, where the International Space Station resides, and back into the moon and on to Mars in the future.
The Gatewayan outpost which will orbit the moon and permit for astronauts to land on the moon, will host study to study space weather and radiation that astronauts along with the hardware they use will encounter when they return to the moon. Scientists at NASA can also use the Gateway to test items astronauts will rely on, such as food and pharmaceuticals, to see how space weather could impact their efficiency, Bleacher said.
Like preparing for climate events on Earth, expecting space weather events allows for better preparation on Earth. Agencies are working together to ensure the space weather paradigm is like the weather paradigm.
"Just as NOAA's National Weather Service creates us a weather-ready nation, what we're driving to be is a distance weather-ready nation," said Elsayed Talaat, director of Office of Projects, Planning and Analysis to NOAA's Satellite and Information Service in Silver Spring, Maryland.
That includes NOAA's Space Weather Follow-On L-1 observatory, which is anticipated to start in 2024 before Solar Cycle 25's predicted peak.
"That is an attempt encompassing 24 agencies across the government, and it has transformed space weather from a research standpoint to operational understanding," Talaat said.
