Surya: New Scientific AI Model for Solar Weather Forecasting

Remember last May, when people far away from the poles saw the Aurora light up the skies? Yes, that was beautiful — but we temporarily lost communication to many satellites, and some spacecraft experienced minor damage.

NASA and IBM built an AI model that predicts these kinds of solar weather events through high-resolution images of the Sun’s surface. The AI model is called Surya, and it is open-source.

“Think of this as a weather forecast for space”, says Juan Bernabe-Moreno, director of IBM Research Europe. “Just as we prepare for hazardous weather events, we need to do the same for solar storms”.

The AI model uses NASA’s nine years of solar observatory data for predicting solar flares, giving it 16 percent more accuracy than the previous prediction methods. It predicts not only solar flares, but also solar wind speeds, spots where flares might occur, and the regions where there will be stronger magnetic fields.

By open-sourcing Surya, scientists all around the world can use it for their own research, speeding up our progress on solar-related studies.

Sometimes the most beautiful things in nature can be very dangerous. Planning ahead is key to keep us prepared and to protect ourselves.

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