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Nanofibers yield stronger, tougher carbon fiber composites

Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) have developed an innovative new technique using carbon nanofibers to enhance binding in carbon fiber and other fiber-reinforced polymer composites—an advance likely to improve structural materials for automobiles, airplanes and other applications that require lightweight and strong materials.

The results, published in the journal Advanced Functional Materials, show promise for making products that are stronger and more affordable, opening new options for U.S. manufacturers to use in applications such as energy and national security.

“The challenge of improving adhesion between carbon fibers and the that surrounds them has been a concern in industry for some time, and a lot of research has gone into different approaches,” said Sumit Gupta, the ORNL researcher who led the project. “What we found is that a hybrid technique using to create chemical and mechanical bonding yields excellent results.”

MiniMax-M1 is a new open source model with 1 MILLION TOKEN context and new, hyper efficient reinforcement learning

From a data platform perspective, teams responsible for maintaining efficient, scalable infrastructure can benefit from M1’s support for structured function calling and its compatibility with automated pipelines. Its open-source nature allows teams to tailor performance to their stack without vendor lock-in.

Security leads may also find value in evaluating M1’s potential for secure, on-premises deployment of a high-capability model that doesn’t rely on transmitting sensitive data to third-party endpoints.

Taken together, MiniMax-M1 presents a flexible option for organizations looking to experiment with or scale up advanced AI capabilities while managing costs, staying within operational limits, and avoiding proprietary constraints.

Quantum mechanics provide truly random numbers on demand

Randomness is incredibly useful. People often draw straws, throw dice or flip coins to make fair choices. Random numbers can enable auditors to make completely unbiased selections. Randomness is also key in security; if a password or code is an unguessable string of numbers, it’s harder to crack. Many of our cryptographic systems today use random number generators to produce secure keys.

But how do you know that a random number is truly random?

Classical computer algorithms can only create pseudorandom numbers, and someone with enough knowledge of the algorithm or the system could manipulate it or predict the next number. An expert in sleight of hand could rig a coin flip to guarantee a heads or tails result. Even the most careful coin flips can have bias; with enough study, their outcomes could be predicted.

Mind-Blowing Speed of Quantum Entanglement Measured for the First Time

In a monumental breakthrough, scientists have measured the speed of quantum entanglement for the first time—an achievement that is set to radically transform the way we understand the quantum world. For years, quantum entanglement was thought to be an instantaneous process, but this new research, published in Physical Review Letters, has pushed the boundaries of our knowledge, providing new insights into the quantum realm and setting the stage for revolutionary advances in data security and computational technologies.

Redefining Cyber Value: Why Business Impact Should Lead the Security Conversation

Security teams face growing demands with more tools, more data, and higher expectations than ever. Boards approve large security budgets, yet still ask the same question: what is the business getting in return? CISOs respond with reports on controls and vulnerability counts – but executives want to understand risk in terms of financial exposure, operational impact, and avoiding loss.

The disconnect has become difficult to ignore. The average cost of a breach has reached $4.88 million, according to recent IBM data. That figure reflects not just incident response but also downtime, lost productivity, customer attrition, and the extended effort required to restore operations and trust. The fallout is rarely confined to security.

Security leaders need a model that brings those consequences into view before they surface. A Business Value Assessment (BVA) offers that model. It links exposures to cost, prioritization to return, and prevention to tangible value.