The findings on the fundamental physics of the Van Allen radiation belts potentially provide insights into understanding energetic particle dynamics at other magnetized planets in the solar system, exoplanets throughout the universe, as well as in astrophysical and laboratory plasmas. In this paper, we provide a review on historical background and recent advances in understanding and modeling acceleration, transport, and loss processes of energetic particles in the Earth's Van Allen radiation belts, followed by outstanding challenges for developing future radiation belt models.

The vulnerability of the myriad of spacecraft that is strongly affected by space weather disruptions, as compared to 1958, has motivated the radiation belt community to develop essential improved models for forecasting the space environment we will inhabit in the 21st century and evaluate its impacts on our technological society. The dynamic properties of trapped outer zone electrons and the outer boundary of the inner zone proton population, along with source populations, have recently been studied in great detail by instruments on National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Van Allen Probes spacecraft, as well as other data sources like operational spacecraft designed for navigation and terrestrial weather forecasting. Discovery of the Earth's Van Allen radiation belts by instruments flown on Explorer 1 in 1958 was the first major discovery of the Space Age.

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