Explain the significance of high-resolution ground-based solar telescopes for space weather forecasting and its implications for critical infrastructure on Earth.

Space weather — solar flares, coronal mass ejections (CMEs) and geomagnetic storms — originates in magnetic processes on the Sun's visible surface, the photosphere. Ground-based telescopes with large apertures now resolve these processes at scales space-based instruments cannot, converting space weather forecasting from broad alerting toward physics-based prediction.

Why resolution matters for forecasting

• The NSF Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope (DKIST), Haleakalā (Hawaii), is the world's first 4-metre class solar telescope, built precisely for such fine-scale magnetic imaging [1].
• Its 2026 Nature study imaged plasma whirlpools ~20 km across at granule edges, identifying Kelvin–Helmholtz instabilities as ubiquitous drivers of plasma mixing — earlier dismissed as blur [2].
• Such vortices "braid" magnetic flux, a candidate mechanism for coronal heating and for the energy build-up released as flares [2]. Modelling the trigger, not just the outburst, extends warning lead time.
• Ground siting permits large mirrors, frequent instrument upgrades and lower cost than orbital observatories — complementing space assets like ISRO's Aditya-L1, which has detected pre-flare brightening from the L1 point [3].

Implications for critical infrastructure

• Power grids: geomagnetically induced currents can damage high-voltage transformers; NOAA notes a National Academies estimate placing a storm-induced grid collapse near $1 trillion [4].
• Satellites: energetic protons corrupt electronics, while storm-heated upper atmosphere increases drag on low-Earth-orbit satellites [5].
• Navigation, aviation, communication: ionospheric disturbance degrades GNSS positioning and HF radio on polar routes [5].
• Advance warning lets grid and satellite operators reduce loads, safe-mode spacecraft and reroute flights [4].

As economies grow more satellite- and grid-dependent, forecasting accuracy becomes an infrastructure-resilience question, not merely a scientific one. India should deepen this capability by modernising its Kodaikanal Solar Observatory, whose 125-year data series and Tower Tunnel Telescope remain globally valuable [6], and pairing ground observation with Aditya-L1 to build an indigenous space weather early-warning system.