According to researchers, our sun may be caused by an extremely powerful “superflare” in the next few decades.

According to a new journal article, stars like our sun can experience one of these superflares about once every century Science. “The new data are a clear reminder that even the most extreme solar events are part of the Sun’s natural repertoire,” said study co-author Natalie Krivová, a solar physicist at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research (MPS). .

These superflares are similar to the solar flares we see emitted from our Sun, except they are much more powerful and release thousands of times more energy than a typical solar flare.

Smaller flares release about 10²⁷ ergy of energy, while larger eruptions such as the Carrington Event of 1859 release around 10³² ergs. Super Flare on the other hand releases energies around 10³⁴ until 10³⁶ ergs.

For comparison, the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan in 1945 was dropped somewhere around the 10th.²⁰ ergy of energy.

“Between 1996 and 2012, 12 solar flares had bolometric energy > 10³² erg, but none were >10³³ erg,” the researchers wrote in the paper.

The only way to measure past solar activity is to look for evidence of violent flares in preserved tree trunks and ancient glacial ice. However, these sources have not allowed researchers to get a true picture of whether the Sun releases superflares and, if so, how often.

“It is not known whether the Sun can unleash even higher-energy eruptions, often referred to as superflares, and if so, how often this might occur,” the researchers wrote in the paper.

In the paper, the researchers took a different approach, measuring the frequency of superflares emitted by sun-like stars around our galaxy to try to get an idea of ​​how often they are released.

“We cannot observe the Sun for thousands of years,” co-author Sami Solanki, director of the MPS, said in a statement. “But instead, we can monitor the behavior of thousands of stars very similar to the Sun over short periods of time. This helps us estimate how often superflares occur.”

The researchers analyzed data from 56,450 stars and found that 2,527 Sun-like stars emitted a total of 2,889 superflares. The stellar data were collected by NASA’s Kepler space telescope between 2009 and 2013.

“As a whole, the Kepler data provide us with evidence for 220,000 years of stellar activity,” co-author Alexander Shapiro, a researcher at the University of Graz in Austria, said in a statement.

This frequency of superflares in the universe shows that stars with a temperature and variability similar to the Sun experience a powerful superflare about once every century.

This may mean that the sun could soon set for one such superflare, especially considering that the Carrington Event 165 years ago – the most powerful eruption we have on record – was not even strong enough to be classified as super flare.

“We were very surprised that Sun-like stars are prone to such frequent superflares,” co-author Valeriy Vasilyev, also a researcher at MPS, said in a statement.

Solar flares themselves can affect Earth by jamming radio communications and altering GPS signals, so a more powerful flare could knock them down even more severely. Additionally, solar flares are often—but not always—accompanied by a plume of solar plasma known as a coronal mass ejection (CME), which can lead to geomagnetic storms in our atmosphere if they collide with our planet.

These geomagnetic storms trigger auroras and also damage power grids and damage satellites.

During the Carrington incident, some telegraph operators reported flying sparks from the equipment, which in some cases caused fires.

Strong geomagnetic storms from CMEs associated with superflares could damage or destroy satellites, and overloading power grids could cause widespread blackouts lasting weeks or months.

However, as the researchers say in the paper, there have been far fewer solar energetic particle events throughout Earth’s history than there would have been if the Sun had unleashed a superflare at this expected 100-year frequency.

“It is unclear whether gigantic eruptions are always accompanied by coronal mass ejections and what the relationship is between superflares and extreme solar particle events. This requires further investigation,” study co-author Ilya Usoskin of the University of Oulu, Finland, said in a statement.

The discovery is useful for scientists because it could help us prepare for extreme geomagnetic storms after a future superflare.

“[If] our sample of Sun-like stars is representative of the Sun’s future behavior, it is significantly more likely to trigger a superflare than previously thought,” the researchers wrote.

Link

Vasiljev, V. et al. (2024). Sun-like stars produce superflares about once
in a century. Science. 386 (6727). https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adl5441