Scientists are preparing for a powerful solar storms in the next year, setting a global chain of monitoring stations to study the so-called "solar maximum". The massive increase in the number of sunspots is expected to cause changes in the ionosphere of the Earth, the shell plasma in the upper part of the atmosphere.

There are concerns that the current generation of satellite navigation technology will not be able to withstand the "solar maximum", and changes in the ionosphere can cause problems with GPS and other signals from space.

Activity increases, and solar and geomagnetic indices on the rise again after a lull following the recent solar maximum. During the solar maximum, there is a large number of sunspots, and the brightness of the solar radiation grows by about 0.1%, which affects the Earth's climate and weather conditions.

The ionosphere becomes the most turbulent, with increasing solar activity during the day and then again in the evening, as her cooling leads to turbulence, including the formation of plasma bubbles.

The influence of the telecommunication system includes a signal delay, the main factor problems for satellite navigation, where accuracy is determined billionth fraction of a second.

Solar maximum is the period of high solar activity in the 11-year cycle of the Sun. Magnetic field of the Sun are the most distorted at this time because of the magnetic field at the sun equator, which rotates slightly faster than the solar poles.