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Helping the Grid Keep Pace with a Power-Hungry Economy
After remaining nearly flat for almost two decades, America’s demand for electricity is growing, driven by data centers for AI, electric vehicles, production of electrofuels, and other factors. This rising demand is one of many reasons the U.S. needs to dramatically ramp up the grid’s capacity to move electricity.
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How to Solve a Bottleneck for CO2 Capture and Conversion
Today’s carbon capture systems suffer a tradeoff between efficient capture and release, but a new approach developed at MIT can boost overall efficiency.
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Catch Me If You Can? Check.
Sandia supports milestone hypersonic missile defense test, helping defend deployed troops and the nation against hypersonic threats.
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How We Think About Protecting Data
A new study shows public views on data privacy vary according to how the data are used, who benefits, and other conditions.
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Five Questions: RAND’s Jim Mitre on Artificial General Intelligence and National Security
A recent RAND paper lays out five hard national security problems that will become very real the moment an artificial general intelligence comes online. The researchers made only one prediction: If we ever get to that point, the consequences will be so profound that the U.S. government needs to take steps now to be ready for them.
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The Future of Open Data in the Age of AI: Safeguarding Public Assets Amid Growing Private Sector Demands
AI offers immense potential, but that potential must be realized within a framework that protects the public’s right to its own information. The open data movement must evolve to meet this new challenge—not retreat from it.
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What if Bin Laden Was Killed in the Era of Generative AI?
By leveraging machine learning to produce AI-generated content, adversaries can weaponize synthetic media, making fact and fiction nearly indistinguishable. The death—or not—of combatant leaders is prime example of the magnitude of the challenge this emerging reality poses.
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AI Model Predicts Lightning Wildfires with 90% Accuracy
Israeli researchers use seven years of weather and satellite data to predict future wildfires caused by lightning strikes.
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Low-Power Sensors Could Last 10 Years, Providing Surveillance, Security
Researchers at Sandia have spent the last three years developing an ultra-low-power chemical sensor to detect sarin and other chemical warfare agents or gaseous industrial toxins, aiming to protect the public and warfighters.
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‘The West Will Lead’: Utah, Idaho, Wyoming Team Up on Nuclear Energy Development
Utah state leaders are taking the next steps in their efforts to make Utah a major nuclear energy development hub and a “national leader” in developing next-generation energy technology, reaching beyond state lines to do it.
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From Help to Harm: How the Government Is Quietly Repurposing Everyone’s Data for Surveillance
The data that people provide to U.S. government agencies for public services such as tax filing, health care enrollment, unemployment assistance and education support is increasingly being redirected toward surveillance and law enforcement.
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Decrypting Tomorrow’s Threats: Critical Infrastructure Needs Post-Quantum Protection Today
Some argue we still have time, since quantum computing capable of breaking today’s encryption is a decade or more away. But breakthrough capabilities, especially in domains tied to strategic advantage, rarely follow predictable timelines. The time to act on the quantum computing threat was yesterday. The next best time is now.
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Quantum Computing - How it Changes Encryption as We Know It
All of the current encryption standards were created without the consideration of quantum computing and its capabilities. Classical computing would take thousands of years, or more, to crack encryption standards such as RSA or ECC. Quantum computing has the potential to break RSA and ECC encryption within hours or even minutes. AES encryption remains the most secure standard currently in use, but quantum computers will crack it in a fraction of the time that classical computers can.
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Next-Gen UAVs Enhance Search and Rescue Efficiency
Search and rescue operations often face difficulties due to unpredictable weather, rugged terrain, and limited resources. UAVs offer a promising approach to search and rescue missions, but there is a need for improved Aerial Person Detection (APD) technologies to enhance the accuracy and efficiency of UAV-based rescue efforts.
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AI-Controlled Fighter Jets May Be Closer Than We Think — and Would Change the Face of Warfare
Could we be on the verge of an era where fighter jets take flight without pilots – and are controlled by artificial intelligence (AI)? US R Adm Michael Donnelly recently said that an upcoming combat jet could be the navy’s last one with a pilot in the cockpit.
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The long view
New Technology is Keeping the Skies Safe
DHS S&T Baggage, Cargo, and People Screening (BCP) Program develops state-of-the-art screening solutions to help secure airspace, communities, and borders
Factories First: Winning the Drone War Before It Starts
Wars are won by factories before they are won on the battlefield,Martin C. Feldmann writes, noting that the United States lacks the manufacturing depth for the coming drone age. Rectifying this situation “will take far more than procurement tweaks,” Feldmann writes. “It demands a national-level, wartime-scale industrial mobilization.”
How Artificial General Intelligence Could Affect the Rise and Fall of Nations
Visions for potential AGI futures: A new report from RAND aims to stimulate thinking among policymakers about possible impacts of the development of artificial general intelligence (AGI) on geopolitics and the world order.
Keeping the Lights on with Nuclear Waste: Radiochemistry Transforms Nuclear Waste into Strategic Materials
How UNLV radiochemistry is pioneering the future of energy in the Southwest by salvaging strategic materials from nuclear dumps –and making it safe.
Model Predicts Long-Term Effects of Nuclear Waste on Underground Disposal Systems
The simulations matched results from an underground lab experiment in Switzerland, suggesting modeling could be used to validate the safety of nuclear disposal sites.