ABSTRACT
While we mostly hear about radiation hazards to living beings, it can also affect inanimate objects, making transparent ones opaque, structures brittle and many other conspicuous changes such as color changes. It can induce permanent or temporary changes in the constitutions of these materials. In the modern space age, when satellite communications are essential to our way of living, a serious concern is radiation damage to satellite instrumentation by cosmic radiation. Van Allen radiation belts extending over 100-60,000 km above the earth’s surface are known regions of high energy electrons and protons among others. The most recent finding shows that there are three radiation belts1 causing excitement among the space and atmospheric science communities.
