Future Sunspot Cycle Predictions

Two Sunspot Cycle Predictions Solar physicists believe the speed of a massive circulating current of hot plasma within the Sun predicts the amplitudes of sunspot cycles approximately twenty years into the future. In recent years that speed has become lower than ever before observed. Based on the plasma-speed/future-cycle-amplitude theory, a team led by physicist Mausumi Dikpata of the National Center for Atmospheric Research predicts Cycle 24 will be intense. NASA solar physicist David Hathaway agrees, but predicts Cycle 25 will be extraordinarily weak. Dikpati's team prediction for Cycle 24 is shown above in pink. Hathaway's Cycle 24 and 25 predictions are shown in red.

Past sunspot cycles up to the spring of 2006 are shown in black.
The two future sunspot cycle predictions are shown in red and pink.

• The Current Sunspot Cycle
• Sunspot Number Determination