Russian physicists and mathematicians from the Higher School of Economics, as well as their colleagues from the University of Northumbria , Bradford University and Hull University (UK), studied solar activity cycles and created a model for predicting the Earth’s climate. This was reported by the press service of the Russian Science Foundation. The results of scientists are published in the journal Scientific Reports.

The sources of the most powerful magnetic fields of the corona of the sun - sunspots - significantly affect the processes taking place on Earth, in particular climate. The number of spots may increase or decrease.

To create a mathematical model of solar activity, scientists investigated a phenomenon called the "solar dynamo", which is responsible for the generation of magnetic fields on the surface of our body. It got its name due to its similarity to the principle of operation of a dynamo-machine that generates an electric current.

As noted in the study, in previous models of the forecast of solar activity the effects of some physical processes on this phenomenon have not yet been taken into account.

Using sunspots, which can increase or decrease, the researchers were able to derive an index of solar activity and compare it with changes in the magnetic field during the astronomical year. As a result, scientists have compiled a graph of the activity of the Sun over the past 100 thousand years and deduced the law, thanks to which climate change on Earth can be predicted.

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Researchers note that since the Maunder minimum (named after the English astronomer Edward Maunder. - RT ) 1645-1715 there is a tendency to increase the average solar luminosity, affecting the increase in the temperature of the Earth's surface. The subsequent maximum will occur in 2600. Moreover, fluctuations in the background magnetic field indicate that solar activity will temporarily decrease over the next thirty years.

“The deduced law allows us to give a long-term forecast of solar magnetic activity. The four-hundred-year-old tendency to increase solar radiation from the time of the Maunder minimum and, accordingly, the Earth’s temperature, may persist for the next six centuries and lead to the fact that by 2600 the Earth’s surface will become warmer by more than 2.5 ° C, ”explained one from the authors, candidate of physical and mathematical sciences Elena Popova.