SOLAR SYSTEM

Detailed explanation-1: -Sunspots are often precursors to solar flares – intense outbursts of energy from the surface of the Sun – so monitoring sunspots is important to understanding why and how flares occur. Additionally, understanding the frequency of flares on other stars is one of the keys to understanding their chance of harboring life.

Detailed explanation-2: -Even with the modern-day host of spacecraft studying the Sun, taking the time to draw sunspots remains the chief way they’re counted. Surveying sunspots is the most basic of ways we study how solar activity rises and falls over time, and it’s the basis of how we track the solar cycle.

Detailed explanation-3: -The Sun powers life on Earth; it helps keep the planet warm enough for us to survive. It also influences Earth’s climate: We know subtle changes in Earth’s orbit around the Sun are responsible for the comings and goings of the past ice ages.

Detailed explanation-4: -Indeed, sunspot data indicate there was a small increase in the amount of incoming sunlight between the late 1800s and the mid-1900s that experts estimate contributed to at most up to 0.1°C of the 1.0°C (1.8°F) of warming observed since the pre-industrial era.