Latest news with #FusaMiyake
Time of India
26-05-2025
- Science
- Time of India
Scientists discover 14000-year-old solar storm which was so powerful that it could fry modern technology in seconds
Throughout history, our planet has been bombarded by solar storms, in the form of bursts of charged particles from the Sun that interact with Earth's magnetic field. Today as most of the world is dependent on technology and signals, even relatively mild space weather can disrupt satellites, power grids, and communications systems. But what if the worst is yet to be discovered, not in the future, but hidden in our distant past? In recent decades, scientists have grown increasingly interested in ancient solar activity. Unlike short-term observations from satellites, nature provides its own long-term record keepers, like tree rings and ice cores. These natural archives hold clues about the Sun's behaviour over thousands of years. Such discoveries not only help us understand our star's historical tantrums but also prepare us for the possibility of future solar storms that could cause massive disruptions to modern technology. The latest discovery has shocked the researchers. Evidence now points to a colossal solar storm that hit Earth over 14,000 years ago, and that storm was possibly far stronger than anything previously recorded, and powerful enough to severely impact today's global infrastructure if it were to happen again. In a study to be published in the July 2025 issue of Earth and Planetary Science Letters, researchers reveal that a solar storm around 12,350 BC left a dramatic carbon signature still visible today. This event, known as a "Miyake Event", named after Japanese physicist Fusa Miyake, who first identified such spikes in 2012, surpasses even the infamous 1859 Carrington Event, long considered the most intense solar storm in recorded history. Miyake Events are characterized by sudden surges in carbon-14, a radioactive isotope created when solar particles bombard Earth's atmosphere. This latest event was identified through tree ring samples from Scots Pines growing along the Drouzet River in France. The carbon-14 spike was validated by elevated beryllium-10 levels found in Greenland ice cores, indicating a truly global phenomenon. What sets this event apart, besides its sheer scale, is the timing. Occurring during the Ice Age, when Earth's atmospheric and magnetic conditions differed massively from today, and the signals were harder to interpret. To overcome this, scientists Kseniia Golubenko and Ilya Usoskin of the University of Oulu in Finland developed a specialized chemistry-climate model that accounted for ancient variables like sea levels, ice sheet positions, and geomagnetic fields. Their analysis revealed that this ancient solar storm unleashed a solar particle barrage 500 times stronger than the most intense storm recorded by satellites in 2005. As Usoskin explained, 'During the 2005 event, a passenger flying over the poles might have received a year's worth of cosmic radiation in one hour; during the Ice Age event, the same dose would have been delivered in just eight seconds.'
India Today
24-05-2025
- Science
- India Today
Blast from the Sun 14,000 years ago was so powerful trees still remember it
Scientists have uncovered evidence of a colossal solar storm that struck Earth more than 14,000 years ago, an event so powerful that its effects are still recorded in tree rings in the upcoming July 2025 issue of Earth and Planetary Science Letters, this ancient storm, which occurred around 12,350 BC, dwarfs any solar storm recorded in modern history and would wreak havoc on today's technology if it were to happen as a "Miyake Event," this storm far surpasses the infamous Carrington Event of 1859, previously considered the benchmark for extreme solar activity. Miyake Events are identified by spikes in carbon-14 levels found in tree rings—carbon-14 being a radioactive isotope produced when solar particles collide with Earth's atmosphere. Since the first discovery by Fusa Miyake in 2012, at least six such events have been confirmed, including those in 774 AD and 993 12,350 BC Miyake Event stands out due to its immense scale and the challenges it posed to scientists trying to interpret it. The spike in carbon-14 was detected in Scots Pine trees along France's Drouzet River, and corroborated by matching beryllium-10 levels in Greenland ice cores, confirming the storm's global interpreting these signals was complicated by the fact that the event occurred during the Ice Age, a period with very different atmospheric and climatic conditions compared to the relatively stable Holocene epoch when most other Miyake Events tackle this, researchers Kseniia Golubenko and Ilya Usoskin from the University of Oulu, Finland, developed a specialised chemistry-climate model. This model accounts for Ice Age variables such as ice sheet boundaries, sea levels, and geomagnetic fields, enabling accurate analysis of the ancient findings reveal that the 12,350 BC storm unleashed a solar particle bombardment 500 times stronger than the largest solar particle storm recorded by satellites in put this in perspective, during the 2005 event, a passenger flying over the poles might have received a year's worth of cosmic radiation in one hour; during the Ice Age event, the same dose would have been delivered in just eight discovery not only redefines the worst-case scenario for space weather but also opens the door to studying even older solar storms, potentially uncovering more extreme events hidden in Earth's ancient Watch
Scientific American
02-05-2025
- Science
- Scientific American
Could the Sun Fry Earth with a Superflare?
In our daily lives, the sun seems constant and quiet, sedately shining at a steady pace. But looks can be deceiving: our star can also blast out powerful solar storms, huge explosions of energy and subatomic particles. If these are directed toward us, they can trigger auroras and disrupt our power grids, as well as play havoc with Earth-orbiting satellites. These storms are magnetic in nature. A fundamental rule in physics is that charged particles create magnetic fields around them as they move. And the sun is brimming with charged particles because its interior is so hot that atoms there are stripped of one or more electrons, forming what we call a plasma. The superhot plasma closer to the core rises, whereas cooler plasma near the surface sinks, creating towering columns of convecting material by the millions, each carrying its own magnetic field. These fields can become entangled near the surface, sometimes snapping—like a spring under too much strain—to release enormous amounts of energy in a single intense explosion at a small spot on the sun. This sudden flash of light accompanied by a colossal burst of subatomic particles is called a solar flare. The most powerful flare we've ever directly measured occurred in 2003, and it emitted about 7 × 10 25 joules of energy in the span of a few hours. That's roughly the amount of energy the whole sun emits in one fifth of a second, which may not sound very impressive—until you remember it comes from just a tiny, isolated region on the sun's surface! On supporting science journalism If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today. We also know that, historically, our star has spat out much bigger flares. High-speed subatomic particles raining down from solar storms slam into the nitrogen in our atmosphere to create an isotope called beryllium 10, or Be-10, which can be captured in polar ice after falling to Earth's surface. By examining ancient ice cores, scientists are able to obtain accurate dates for spikes in Be-10 (and other related isotopes), which can then be used to track historic solar activity. Such isotopic spikes have revealed what may be the most powerful solar eruption in relatively recent history, an event that occurred in 7176 B.C.E. Scientists argued at first about the cause of these spikes; the sun's activity didn't seem powerful enough to create the amounts of isotopes seen. Supernovae or gamma-ray bursts could explain the spikes, too—but only by occurring rather close to our planet, and that should've left behind other forms of evidence that, so far, scientists haven't found. Consequently, the current consensus is that the sun is indeed responsible for these massive upticks in isotopes. Scientists now call these spikes ' Miyake events,' in honor of Japanese cosmic-ray physicist Fusa Miyake, a leader in discovering and understanding them. While these flares were huge, there are reasons to suspect the sun is capable of unleashing even bigger ones. Some stars undergo what are called superflares, which are ridiculously powerful, reaching a total energy of 10 29 joules, or the equivalent of what the sun emits over the course of 20 minutes. In more human terms, that's about 300 million years' worth of our global civilization's current annual energy usage—all squeezed into a brief burst of stellar activity. Superflares are relatively rare. Observing them in any given star would take a stroke of luck—unless you stack the odds in your favor. That's just what an international team of astronomers did. The Kepler spacecraft monitored about half a million stars over a period of a decade, looking for telltale signs of accompanying planets. But all those data can be used for other things, too. The astronomers looked for superflares arising from more than 56,000 sunlike stars in Kepler's observations—which added up to a remarkable 220,000 total observed years of stellar activity. The researchers published the results in Science in late 2024. By sifting through that vast dataset, the team found 2,889 likely superflares on 2,527 sunlike stars. That works out to roughly one superflare per sunlike star per century, which seems pretty terrifying because it would presumably mean the sun sends out an explosive superflare every hundred years or so. But let's not be so hasty. For one thing, a star's rotation can powerfully influence the development of flare-spewing magnetic fields, and the rotational period was unknown for 40,000 of the study's examined stars—so it's possible this part of the sample isn't representative of the actual sun. And 30 percent of the superflare-producing stars were in binary systems with a stellar companion, which could also affect the results. The list of potential confounding variables doesn't stop here—there are several other factors that might make a seemingly sunlike star more prone to producing superflares than our own sun is. Then again, as I already mentioned, Be-10 and other telltale isotopes can be produced in other ways that don't involve stellar flares. And, for that matter, it's not at all clear how well superflares would specifically make such particles. So although we've counted five sun-attributed Be-10 spikes across the last 10,000 years, that doesn't mean the sun has only produced that many strong flares in that time. Perhaps there were others that left more subtle, as-yet-unidentified records in the ice—or that weren't aimed at Earth and therefore produced no terrestrial isotopic signal at all. If the sun did blow off a superflare today, what would be the effects? The impacts to life on Earth would probably be pretty minimal; our planet's magnetic field acts as a shield against incoming subatomic particles, and our atmosphere would absorb most of the associated high-energy electromagnetic radiation (such as gamma and x-rays). Our technological civilization is another matter, though. A huge flare could fry the electronics on all but the most protected satellites and disrupt power grids to cause widespread and long-lasting blackouts. Engineers have devised safeguards to prevent damaging electrical surges from most instances of extreme space weather, but if a flare is powerful enough, there may not be much we could do to avoid severe damage. Should we worry? The takeaway from the study is that it's possible the sun produces superflares more often than we previously thought, but this conclusion is not conclusive. So consider this research a good start—and a good argument for getting more and better information. Don't panic just yet!
Roya News
14-04-2025
- Science
- Roya News
Internet blackout? Scientists warn solar storm could crash digital world
A team of scientists has issued a stark warning about the possibility of a massive solar storm that could hit Earth without warning, causing widespread damage to satellites, power grids, and the digital infrastructure that modern society heavily relies on. Although such powerful solar flares haven't been recorded in over a thousand years, experts say a similar event today could pose an unprecedented threat to global systems dependent on electricity and digital connectivity. This type of solar event is known as a 'Miyake event,' named after Japanese researcher Fusa Miyake, who in 2012 identified an unusual spike in carbon-14 levels in tree rings dating back roughly 1,250 years—evidence of a colossal solar explosion that once sent high-energy particles hurtling toward Earth. Professor Matthew Owens of the University of Reading explained that a modern Miyake event "could burn out power transformers and collapse entire energy grids,' adding that restoring these networks would be a lengthy process due to the time required to produce and replace damaged transformers. What would happen if Earth were hit by a severe solar storm? Widespread collapse of electrical power grids Internet and telecommunications outages Disruption of satellites and air/sea navigation systems Shutdown of water treatment and sanitation facilities Spoilage of refrigerated and stored food due to power cuts Dangerous radiation levels at high altitudes Depletion of the ozone layer by up to 8.5%, triggering major climate effects Rare auroras visible in unusual locations around the globe Scientists warn that the warning time for such an event would be limited to just 18 hours—insufficient for global preventive measures. According to researchers, a Miyake event could be at least ten times more powerful than the infamous 1859 Carrington Event, which disrupted telegraph systems and caused auroras near the equator. A recent study by the University of Queensland concluded that a similar event today could deal a severe blow to the digital and technological world, triggering long-term internet outages and massive disruptions to the global economy, especially due to the fragile nature of digital infrastructure and the difficulty of predicting such cosmic disasters.
