Sun’s awakening sends trouble to Earth
Earth has to brace for the Sun's new activity after a long and deep sleep, scientists at the Institute of Science Education and Research said today.
A heightened activity on the Sun's surface, which includes solar storms and sunspot flares should be blamed for some faulty communication, particularly, radio transmissions experienced here on Earth.
In the science journal Nature, the assistant director of the Australian Ionospheric Prediction Service, Phil Wilkinson agreed that sunspots and solar flares, (which are bigger explosions on the Sun's surface) could cause major disturbances on earth.
"A particularly violent solar storm could release plasma that could interfere with GPS and satellites if it made its way to the earth's atmosphere," he said as quoted by the Sydney Morning Herald.
Scientists also revealed that changes in the so-called plasma below the sun's surface were the cause of its recent period of hibernation of more than one and half years.
Further studies are being done to counter such activities of the sun on Earth's communication facilities.