Solar Particle Events Could Deplete Ozone, Raise UV Levels and Increase DNA Damage [Study]

Solar storms are not the worst demonstration of the Sun's power. The star at the heart of our solar system can be more destructive during a solar particle event.

How Damaging Is the Sun's Solar Particle Event?

The Sun can occasionally produce far more devastating effects than the solar storm we witness in May through the fantastic auroras. From the Sun's surface, these proton bursts, called "solar particle events," can beam out into space like a searchlight.

Records indicate that Earth is struck by an extreme solar particle event around every thousand years, which has the potential to seriously destroy the ozone layer and raise surface UV radiation levels. In addition to their direct impact, solar particle events can initiate a series of chemical processes in the upper atmosphere that may lead to ozone depletion.

Harmful UV light from the Sun is absorbed by ozone, affecting the climate and damaging DNA, increasing the risk of skin cancer.

In a new study, researchers investigated the effects of an intense solar particle event using huge computer models of global atmospheric chemistry. They discovered that such an occurrence might cause ozone depletion for around a year, increasing surface UV levels and causing more DNA damage.

However, ozone damage would persist for six years, raising UV levels by 25% and speeding up the rate of solar-induced DNA damage by up to 50% if a solar proton event occurred when Earth's magnetic field was very weak.

The most recent weak magnetic field epoch, which started 42,000 years ago and lasted roughly 1,000 years, included a brief shift in the north and south poles. Around this time, several significant evolutionary events happened, including the extinction of the last Neanderthals in Europe and the kangaroo and wombat extinctions in Australia.

The Earth's geomagnetic field has also been connected to a larger evolutionary event. After a 26 million-year era of a weak or nonexistent magnetic field, multicellular creatures first appeared near the end of the Ediacaran period (from 565 million years ago), as evidenced by fossils found in South Australia's Flinders Ranges.

Similarly, geomagnetism and ultraviolet solid radiation have also been linked to the quick evolution of several animal groups during the Cambrian Explosion (c. 539 million years ago). It has been suggested that the greatest way to detect and avoid the dangerous incoming UV radiation is for various unrelated groups to evolve hard body shells simultaneously and eyes, a process known as "flight from light."

ALSO READ: Why Intense Solar Storms and Weak Magnetic Field Are Deadly Combo for Earth?

What Is Solar Particle Events?

Solar Particle Event (SPE), also known as solar radiation storm or solar energetic particle event, is a solar phenomenon that happens when protons and other solar-emitted particles are accelerated in interplanetary space by a coronal mass ejection shock or in the Sun's atmosphere during a solar flare.

During the explosion, other nuclei, such as helium and HZE ions, might also accelerate. These particles can cross the magnetic field of Earth and partially ionize the ionosphere.

For astronauts on exploration missions outside the shield of Earth's magnetic field, radiation exposure from solar particle events (SPEs) poses a serious health risk that could compromise their performance and possibly lead to mission failure. Due to our poor understanding of many physical processes involved in the occurrence of SPEs, accurately assessing the impact of these events on human exploration missions remains challenging.