Rapidly intensifying marine cyclones over the extratropical oceans have been a focus of active meteorological research for the past two decades. Sanders and Gyakum (1980) defined rapid development as deepening of more than 24 mb over a 24-h period, geostrophically adjusted to 60o latitude. Attention to this problem arose because earlier operational models systematically underpredicted the intensification rate of these cyclones, resulting in danger and lost revenues to the ocean shipping industry. The scientific issue is whether these storms are dynamically different from ordinary baroclinic cyclones. Three major field programs, Genesis of Atlantic Lows Experiment 1986 (GALE; Dirks et al. 1988), Experiment on Rapidly Intensifying Cyclones over the Atlantic (ERICA; Hadlock and Kreitzberg 1988), and Fronts and Atlantic Storm Track Experiment (FASTEX; Joly et al. 1997) were launched with the specific goals of improving our understanding of the physical mechanisms controlling the formation and rapid development of extratropical cyclones, and providing testbed data sets to improve and verify numerical models for accurate simulation of these storms. The purpose of this paper is to summarize the progress in the research on modeling and prediction of explosive marine cyclogenesis during the past two decades. The contribution of Richard J. Reed in explosive cyclogenesis studies will be highlighted.