Climaxing last week [May 15, 2013], the sun will have unleashed three X-class solar flares. These are the strongest flares of the year so far, and they signal a significant increase in solar activity with more to come. Historically, research has been conducted to link the 11 year cycle of the sun to changes in human behavior and society. Research done in the last hundred years that shows the most malefic effects from solar activity come at the sunspot minima.
Solar flares are intense blooms of radiation that come from the release of the magnetic energy associated with sunspots. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) ranks solar flares using five categories from weakest to stongest: A, B, C, M, and X. Each category is 10 times stronger than the one before it. Within each category, a flare is ranked from 1 to 9, according to strength, although X-class flares can go higher than 9. According to NASA, the most powerful solar flare recorded was an X28 (in 2003).
