gps

start of a new solar flare cycle

submitted by robertkamper on mon, 2008-01-14 00:26.

The first sunspot of the year apparently signals the beginning of a new 11 year cycle of heightened solar activity.

Highly charged material ejected from the sun during solar storms causes power outages and disrupts satellite communications that can affect everything from taking cash out of an ATM to chatting on a cell phone. In addition, this solar cycle will be the first to occur in an era when global positioning system, or GPS, technology is widely used