The top trending toys of 2026, according to Amazon, Walmart and social media  goodmorningamerica.com

Detroit Lions say Jameson Williams is trending up in their own grades  Detroit Free Press

Buffalo Bills trending up, trending down ahead of Chargers game in Week 3  Buffalo Rumblings

Lions, Jets injury report: Detroit’s OL trending in right direction  Pride Of Detroit

4 Fantasy Football Players Trending Up & Down: Week 3 (2026)  FantasyPros

1. Leaks reveal a new Apple HomePod mini, iPad mini, and Apple TV 4K  The Verge
2. New Apple TV 4K Leaked  macrumors.com
3. The next iPad mini is shaping off to be a monster upgrade  Macworld
4. iPad mini finally getting FaceTime camera move, leak suggests  AppleInsider
5. Apple has big October coming for new hardware and software, here’s the lineup  9to5Mac

Keychron Thunderbolt 5 Dock Review: Unusually Sensible  Engadget

1. After seven years, a spacecraft company is releasing its Otters into the wild  Ars Technica
2. With NASA’s backing, Starfish Space is getting ready for the orbital debut of its flagship Otter spacecraft  GeekWire
3. Starfish Space ready to launch its first Otter spacecraft  SpaceNews
4. Starfish Space Readies First Debris Inspector, Space Brief 25 Sep 2026  keeptrack.space
5. Starfish Space’s Debut Otter Vehicle Hitches a Ride on SpaceX’s Transporter-18 Launch  satellitetoday.com

1. Motorola Signature 27 confirmed to support GrapheneOS  9to5Google
2. Inside Snapdragon Summit 2026: Agentic AI PCs, Googlebooks and Linux are here  Qualcomm
3. Qualcomm releases Android chip built for AI as memory shortage weighs on smartphone market  cnbc.com
4. Motorola Signature 27 Is Coming to the US to Rival Samsung’s Galaxy Phones  CNET
5. Motorola and Bang & Olufsen announce multi-year partnership to co-create premium audio experiences  motorolanews.com

1. I Tested the Apple Watch's New Heart Rate Sensor to See If It's Really Better Than Garmin's  lifehacker.com
2. Apple Watch Ultra 4 Review: It Just Keeps Getting Better  CNET
3. Apple Watch Ultra 4 vs Apple Watch Series 12: Every Difference Detailed!  DC Rainmaker
4. Apple Watch Series 12 Review: Better Health Tracking Makes This A Worthwhile Upgrade  bgr.com
5. The Apple Watch Has a Hidden New Setting You Probably Didn’t Know About  Gear Patrol

2026-2027 DWU: Middle School Design Challenge

Overview

The 2026-2027 challenge theme is, “Fueling Flight Design Challenge: New Energy Systems.” 

As more and more aircraft are a part of the US’ National Airspace System (NAS), NASA and partners at the FAA, at universities, and in the aviation industry are searching for ways to increase safety, make flight more affordable, find new fuels for aircraft, and reduce the amount of time passengers and cargo spend in the air. This year’s Dream with Us Challenge focuses on new aircraft fuels and how even the addition of one new fuel will change both the aircraft they are used in and the airports where aircraft take off and land.  

The “Fueling Flight Design Challenge: New Energy Systems” challenge is open to middle and high school students, with a different task for middle school teams and high school teams. Teams for both categories will focus on the addition of an emerging aircraft fuel source, liquid natural gas (LNG) into our aviation environment. This will require teams to learn more about LNG, how it might be used in aviation, the benefits of an additional fuel source, and what kind of changes would need to be made to aircraft and to airports to adapt to these new changes.  

Since the early days of aviation, commercial aircraft have relied on traditional designs and infrastructure. Aircraft have been a similar “tube-and-wing” design, with limitations that were made because of the materials aircraft were made with, along with the technology to build these aircraft. With the increasing availability of new technologies and new materials, aircraft no longer need to follow the same basic design. In addition, new research about fuel types, increasing demand for more flights and more fuel has resulted in many different options that include types of fuel, increasing electrification, and more. That also means airports are going to need to adjust. Changes in airport infrastructure will be needed to add multiple fuel types, different gateway configurations to allow for new aircraft types, and perhaps even different areas for different aircraft. What will this all look like? That partially depends on researchers and designers in the future since these are challenges the aeronautics community is starting to face now and will continue to do in the future.   

Challenge Description

Middle school student teams of 2-4 members will adapt an existing airport (or create one of their own) that incorporates the use of both liquefied natural gas (LNG) and traditional aviation fuel. The airport design should include the overall airport layout that includes (but is not limited to): control tower(s), hangars, fuel locations, terminal, passenger parking, runways. See requirements below for specific details. 

Challenge Rules

The 2026/2027 Dream with Us Design Challenge for middle and high school students opens September 25, 2026. The submission period for middle school entrants begins September 25, 2026, and concludes on January 22, 2027, at 11:59 pm ET. Schools, organizations, and community groups should communicate to parents and guardians that submissions are limited to one entry per team and team registration requires someone over the age of 13 to create the account (adult team sponsors may create the registration on the team’s behalf if desired). Entries must be submitted through the submission link on the Dream with Us Design Challenge webpage: https://www.nasa.gov/dream-with-us/. Signed permission forms from parents or legal guardians are required for all participants that agree to the terms and requirements listed below and on the submission form. 

Use of AI

Use of artificial intelligence tools for challenge-related work is not permitted. Teams must not upload, process, or generate any content using AI systems, including publicly available browser‑based GenAI services, AI‑assisted code generation tools, or AI‑generated imagery. All submissions must be created solely by team members without the assistance of AI.

Grade Eligibility

The middle school challenge is open to all participants in grades 6 – 8 who are attending public, private, parochial, and home schools in the United States of America and children of U.S. military members stationed overseas.

Students in grades 9 – 12 will use the high school module. See the Dream with Us main webpage for details. Note: for teams that have both middle and high school students, those teams will compete in the high school challenge. 

Dates

Submissions for the Dream with Us: Middle School Aviation Challenge are accepted September 25, 2026 – January 22, 2027. Submission link: INSERT LINK HERE. Winners will first be announced during a virtual awards reception (date TBD) then shared on social media and the Dream with Us design challenge webpage after the reception. 

Key Dates

Submissions for the Dream with Us: Middle School Aviation Challenge are accepted September 25, 2026 – January 22, 2027. Submission link: INSERT LINK HERE. Winners will first be announced during a virtual awards reception (date TBD) then shared on social media and the Dream with Us design challenge webpage after the reception. 

• Challenge begins September 25, 2026 through January 22, 2027
• Registration Deadline: ?
• Submission Deadline: ?
• Finalists selected and announced: ?
• Finalist presentations (Virtual): ?
• Winners Announcement: ?

Challenge Rules

Challenge Rules

The 2026/2027 Dream with Us Design Challenge for middle and high school students opens September 25, 2026. The submission period for middle school entrants begins September 25, 2026, and concludes on January 22, 2027, at 11:59 pm ET. Schools, organizations, and community groups should communicate to parents and guardians that submissions are limited to one entry per team and team registration requires someone over the age of 13 to create the account (adult team sponsors may create the registration on the team’s behalf if desired). Entries must be submitted through the submission link on the Dream with Us Design Challenge webpage: https://www.nasa.gov/dream-with-us/. Signed permission forms from parents or legal guardians are required for all participants that agree to the terms and requirements listed below and on the submission form.  

Requirements

Each team submission will have two separate categories: technical and creative. Both categories must be included for consideration. Note: all sources for the presentation should be cited, including images. Please see the section above for rules about the use of AI. 

1. All submissions must be the original work of the students.  
2. Any graphics that are included in your submission must meet accessibility standards. 
   • To make your documents accessible and compliant with Section 508, it’s important to add descriptive alt tags to all images, diagrams, and graphics. Alt tags provide text descriptions that assist screen readers in conveying visual information to users with disabilities. When adding alt tags, use clear and concise language to describe the purpose and content of each image. In Microsoft Word, right-click the image, select “Edit Alt Text,” and enter your description. This simple step ensures everyone can access and understand your content, regardless of their abilities. 
   • Alt Text Sample on a PC (right click over the image and a drop down will appear, select “inspect accessibility properties and it will open the web inspector.”View Alt Text” option. If you select that option an “Alt Text” window opens with a grey box and instructions for how to create the alt tag.
   • Alt Text Sample on a Mac (right click over the image and a drop down will appear, select inspect accessibility properties and it will open the web inspector. There is a gray area that is highlighted. It is the location of the image alt tag in the code. You may need to click the gray arrow next to the word “image” in order to see the whole alt tag. To hide the properties window click on the X in the top right corner of the window.

Technical Category Requirements

The technical presentation, using PowerPoint or similar, must include: 

1. Title slide: Include Team name, school or organization, and first name, last initial of each team member (DO NOT INCLUDE LAST NAMES OF TEAM MEMBERS) 
2. Labeled layout of the airport 
3. Explanation of the changes that were made to the airport to accommodate multiple fuel types  
4. There should be a focus on safety, airport benefits, and any considerations of new types of aircraft that will be taking off and landing from the airport. 
5. The presentation can be recorded with a narrative but is not required. If there is no audio with the presentation, slides should be self explanatory. 

Creative Product

The team’s creative submission will be a presentation that advertises the benefits of the new airport modification, allowing two different types of fuels to be utilized at the airport. The audience could be city or state leadership, stores interested in investing in a location at the airport, airlines who may want to now fly to this airport (this is up to you!). How you choose to present this advertisement for improvements is up to you. It could be any of the following (or maybe you have another creative idea): 

1. Video 
2. Brochure 
3. Flyer 
4. Infographic 
5. Commercial 
6. Website 
7. Other 
8. Any videos, commercials, websites, or similar will require you to provide a link to us (this can be done by attaching a Word document or PDF with a link or QR code to access the content); be sure we are able to access those links to accurately judge the project.  

Submitting Entries

All middle school entries will be submitted through the NASA Gateway link found INSERT GATEWAY LINK HERE and on the Dream with Us Design Challenge webpage. All entries must include the following:  

1. Signed permission form completed by parent or legal guardian of each student.   

2. Presentations must be submitted in a PDF format. PDFs are limited to 10 MB.  

3. Artwork must be submitted as high-resolution images of the original artwork in .jpg or .png format (minimum of 2,400 pixels on the longest edge). Note: AI-generated work will not be accepted. 

4. Any included videos must be uploaded to YouTube with a “watch URL” link  or QR code submitted as a PDF document. 

Challenge Resources

The following lessons and activities can be used to help participants learn more about aircraft and airport design, along with other aircraft considerations: 

• Design Your Own X-Plane 

• Name That Plane 

• Propeller Design Challenge 

• X-Plane Glider Challenge 

• Weighed Down Activity 

• Using Airplane Space Efficiently Activity 

• Prioritize Your Flight Activity (9-12) 

• Prioritize Your Flight Activity (5-8) 
  • Prioritize Your Flight Pros/Cons worksheet 

• FAA Airport Design Challenge 

Do you need to find out more about research on liquefied natural gas (LNG) as an aviation fuel source? Find out more here: 

• AACES 2050 
• Fundamental Experimental Tests and Modeling of LOX/CH4 Engines at High Pressures 
• “As Jet Fuel Supplies Tighten, Can Other Fuels Meet Demand?”

Judging and Criteria

Entries will be evaluated by industry experts based on impact, practicality, originality, and how well the idea is communicated. Judges will make award selections based on the above-mentioned criteria to determine which projects will be recognized.  

Mid-Point Check-In

Are you an educator who needs to know more about how to support a team or multiple teams? Are you a student wanting to know more about how to participate? Join us in October, when we will set up a mid-point check-in! Stay tuned for those dates to be released on the Dream with Us design challenge webpage.  

Questions: 

If you have any additional questions, please reach out to the NASA Aeronautics STEM team at aeroSTEM@nasa.onmicrosoft.com.  

Dream With Us: High School Engineering Challenge

Dream With Us

2026-2027 DWU: High School Engineering Challenge

Challenge Materials

1. Engineering Notebook Template
2. Scoring Rubric

Overview

The 2026-2027 challenge theme is, “Fueling Flight Design Challenge: New Energy Systems.”

As more and more aircraft are a part of the US’ National Airspace System (NAS), NASA and partners at the FAA, at universities, and in the aviation industry are searching for ways to increase safety, make flight more affordable, find new fuels for aircraft, and reduce the amount of time passengers and cargo spend in the air. This year’s Dream with Us Challenge focuses on new aircraft fuels and how even the addition of one new fuel will change both the aircraft they are used in and the airports where aircraft take off and land.  

The “Fueling Flight Design Challenge: New Energy Systems” challenge is open to middle and high school students, with a different task for middle school teams and high school teams. Teams for both categories will focus on the addition of an emerging aircraft fuel source, liquefied natural gas (LNG) into our aviation environment. This will require teams to learn more about LNG, how it might be used in aviation, the benefits of an additional fuel source, and what kind of changes would need to be made to aircraft and to airports to adapt to these new changes.  

Since the early days of aviation, commercial aircraft have relied on traditional designs and infrastructure. Aircraft have been a similar “tube-and-wing” design, with limitations that were made because of the materials aircraft were made with, along with the technology to build these aircraft. With the increasing availability of new technologies and new materials, aircraft no longer need to follow the same basic design. In addition, new research about fuel types, increasing demand for more flights and more fuel has resulted in many different options that include types of fuel, increasing electrification, and more. That also means airports are going to need to adjust. Changes in airport infrastructure will be needed to add multiple fuel types, different gateway configurations to allow for new aircraft types, and perhaps even different areas for different aircraft. What will this all look like? That partially depends on researchers and designers in the future since these are challenges the aeronautics community is starting to face now and will continue to do in the future.   

Scenario

Globally each year, over 62 million metric tons of air cargo are transported, which is more than 33% of global trade by value. This equates to about $8.3 trillion annually. With these large numbers, even a small increase in efficiency can have a large economic impact.

A major air freight company has announced that they are looking to replace some of their fleet with a new aircraft and are interested in new designs to increase efficiency and that will utilize a different type of fuel. Your team has been tasked by your aircraft company to develop a new concept cargo aircraft to present to the air freight company. Your team has been directed to focus on a design that will use liquefied natural gas, or LNG. Since LNG must be stored differently than traditional jet fuel, the aircraft design needs to adapt. These changes, however, may lead to innovative designs that are more aerodynamically efficient.

The air freight company has provided the following requirements.

• Crew: 2 pilots. Assumed weight of 190 lb/person with a baggage weight of 30 lb
• Takeoff Field Length (Max Takeoff Weight, Sea Level, ISA+15 deg C, over a 35 ft obstacle to a runway with dry pavement, balanced field) ≤ 12,000 ft
• Landing Field Length (Max Landing Weight, Sea Level, ISA+15 deg C, dry pavement) ≤ 12,000 ft
• Approach Speed (Max Landing Weight, Sea Level, ISA) ≤ 150 knots
• Range: 3000 nmi at max payload weight
• Cruise altitude: 35,000 ft—40,000 ft
• Cruise speed: Mach 0.8
• Reserve mission: Loiter for 30 min at 13,000 ft, Mach 0.8
• FAA Airplane Design Group (ADG) ‘IV’
• Cargo
  • Total cargo weight of 125,000 lb
  • Cargo volume of at least 15,000 ft³
  • Cargo must be transported using standard unit load devices (ULD). Selection of the specific ULD type(s) is up to the team. The weight of the ULDs is included in total cargo weight.

Teams will be provided with performance information for the jet engine.

Challenge Rules

The high school module is for students in grades 9 – 12. Students in grades 6 – 8 will use the middle school module. See the Dream with Us main webpage for details. Note: for teams that have both middle and high school students, those teams will compete in the high school challenge. 

The high school challenge is open to all participants in grades 9 – 12 who are attending public, private, parochial, and home schools in the United States of America and children of U.S. military members stationed overseas.  

The 2026/2027 Dream with Us Design Challenge for middle and high school students opens September 25, 2026. The submission period for middle school entrants begins September 25, 2026, and concludes on January 22, 2027, at 11:59 pm ET. Schools, organizations, and community groups should communicate to parents and guardians that submissions are limited to one entry per team and team registration requires someone over the age of 13 to create the account (adult team sponsors may create the registration on the team’s behalf if desired). Entries must be submitted through the submission link on the Dream with Us Design Challenge webpage: https://www.nasa.gov/dream-with-us/. Signed permission forms from parents or legal guardians are required for all participants that agree to the terms and requirements listed below and on the submission form. 

Use of AI

Use of artificial intelligence tools for challenge-related work is not permitted. Teams must not upload, process, or generate any content using AI systems, including publicly available browser‑based GenAI services, AI‑assisted code generation tools, or AI‑generated imagery. All submissions must be created solely by team members without the assistance of AI.

Engineering Design Notebook

The final product for this challenge is to prepare and submit an Engineering Design Notebook. 

Teams of judges will evaluate your work based on what you submit in your Engineering Design Notebook. Your team should look through the Scoring Rubric and begin to do research to design a system to address the requirements of the notebook; specifics about the notebook requirements can be found in the Scoring Rubric. The headings in the Scoring Rubric should be used as the headings in your Engineering Design Notebook. Fill in sections of the Engineering Design Notebook as you complete the work in each section.  

Engineering Design Template (insert) 

Scoring Rubric (insert) 

Resources

The following research resources can get you started on your work. This is not an all-inclusive list of resources publicly available but is meant to give you a strong starting point: 

AACES 2050 

Fundamental Experimental Tests and Modeling of LOX/CH4 Engines at High Pressures 

“As Jet Fuel Supplies Tighten, Can Other Fuels Meet Demand?” 

Important Dates and Deadlines

• Sep. 25, 2026 – Challenge goes live

• TBD (check back soon!) – Information Session

• Dec. 08, 2026 – Registration Deadline

• Jan. 25, 2027 – Submission Deadline

• Mar. 19, 2027 – Finalists selected and announced

• Apr. 2, 2027 – Finalist presentations (virtual)
• Apr. 9, 2027 –Winners Announcement

Submitting Entries

All high school entries will be submitted through the NASA Gateway link found INSERT GATEWAY LINK HERE and on the Dream with Us Design Challenge webpage. All entries must include the following:  

1. Signed permission form completed by parent or legal guardian of each student.   
2. Presentations must be submitted in a PDF format. PDFs are limited to 10 MB. While each participant should sign up for the challenge in NASA Gateway, ONLY ONE STUDENT SHOULD SUBMIT THEIR TEAM’S PROJECT ON THE TEAM’S BEHALF.  
3. Artwork must be submitted as high-resolution images of the original artwork in .jpg or .png format (minimum of 2,400 pixels on the longest edge). Note: AI-generated work will not be accepted. 
4. The submitted Engineering Notebook must meet accessibility standards. 
   • To make your documents accessible and compliant with Section 508, it’s important to add descriptive alt tags to all images, diagrams, and graphics. Alt tags provide text descriptions that assist screen readers in conveying visual information to users with disabilities. When adding alt tags, use clear and concise language to describe the purpose and content of each image. In Microsoft Word, right-click the image, select “Edit Alt Text,” and enter your description. This simple step ensures everyone can access and understand your content, regardless of their abilities. 
   • Alt Text Sample on a PC (right click over the image and a drop down will appear, select “inspect accessibility properties and it will open the web inspector.”View Alt Text” option. If you select that option an “Alt Text” window opens with a grey box and instructions for how to create the alt tag.
   • Alt Text Sample on a Mac (right click over the image and a drop down will appear, select inspect accessibility properties and it will open the web inspector. There is a gray area that is highlighted. It is the location of the image alt tag in the code. You may need to click the gray arrow next to the word “image” in order to see the whole alt tag. To hide the properties window click on the X in the top right corner of the window.

Judging and Criteria

Entries will be evaluated by industry experts based on impact, practicality, originality, and how well the idea is communicated. Projects will go through several levels of judging. Top teams will be asked to take part in the finalist stage, where participants will be asked to join a select group of industry judges and virtually present their projects (see timeline for dates). A panel of Blue Ribbon Judges will then make award selections based to determine which projects will be recognized.  

A Scoring Rubric (see above) is available as a guide for teams. This does not need to be submitted with the team’s project. 

Mid-Point Check-In

Are you an educator who needs to know more about how to support a team or multiple teams? Are you a student wanting to know more about how to participate? Join us in October, when we will set up a mid-point check-in! Stay tuned for those dates to be released on the Dream with Us design challenge webpage.  

Questions: 

If you have any additional questions, please reach out to the NASA Aeronautics STEM team at aeroSTEM@nasa.onmicrosoft.com.  

Dream With Us: High School Engineering Challenge

Dream With Us

A chaotic secret hides within this seemingly serene image of spiral galaxy NGC 4698 taken by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and released on Sept. 18, 2026. As a spiral galaxy like our own Milky Way galaxy, NGC 4698 has spiral arms that curl around within a thin disk of stars, gas, and dust. These arms are marked by opaque clumps of brown dust and dotted with small collections of bright blue stars.

Unlike many other spiral galaxies, NGC 4698’s delicate spiral arms are only prominent in the outer reaches of the disk; spiral arms often wind down to the very center of a galaxy, but NGC 4698’s spiral arms appear to shy away from its glowing center. The arms instead hover in a ring-like structure around the perimeter of the galaxy.

Read more about this unusual spiral galaxy.

Text credit: ESA/Hubble

Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, D. Thilker, the MAUVE-HST Team

For more information, contact Donald S. Parker, Kennedy Space Center, donald.s.parker@nasa.gov

Download the PDF version

Improper casting and forging processes in the manufacture of aluminum alloy 2219 can lead to microstructural defects that result in a sub-optimal response to anodic surface treatments and an increase in corrosion susceptibility. This Technical Bulletin communicates the risks of improper casting and recommends a homogenizing step followed by multidirectional deformation after conventional direct chill casting, especially for larger castings. 09/24/26 DOC ID: 20260008373

Background
Aluminum 2219 is an age-hardenable, over-saturated, aluminum-copper alloy developed by Aluminum Company of America (Alcoa) in 1954, for service up to 600 °F. Numerous aerospace applications include launch and space vehicles including space shuttle fuel tanks, and International Space Station human-rated pressurized modules. It has excellent cryogenic properties, weldability, workability, and mechanical properties at low and high temperatures [1].

Problem/Issue Description
Casting 2219 aluminum alloy ingots is a specialized process used to manufacture large-scale structures that are subsequently forged or rolled into final product forms. The as-cast ingot internal defects may include disparate grain sizes, macrosegregation of alloying elements, and residual banded and clustered copper-rich intermetallics, which can lead to unsatisfactory mechanical and corrosion properties including low ductility, low strength, and a non-uniform distribution of material properties in the final product form. [2,11,12]

These defects can be somewhat mitigated with post-casting processes, including mechanical deformation, solution treatment, quenching, and aging. However, if ingots already possess unrecoverable discontinuities such as interdendritic segregation, banded and clustered large copper intermetallics, and disparate grain sizes, no subsequent thermos-mechanical processing will remedy the deficiencies in properties, especially for larger ingot sizes.

Homogenization as an Essential Step
Homogenization after casting greatly improves the final properties’ subsequent mechanical processing. Studies show that Fick’s laws of diffusion drive the highly concentrated copper atoms out of the interdendritic boundary zones, distributing them evenly across the aluminum matrix grains; residual phases are dissolved into the matrix, and degree of segregation of all elements reduces dramatically. Homogenization processing parameters need to be optimized for ingot cross-section thickness to ensure proper and uniform thermal response. Wang et al., who focused on homogenization, effectively used a temperature and time of 535 °C for 10 hours [3].

Homogenization optimization variables include the melting point, amount and dissolution rate of the eutectic phase, ingot size, grain size and copper content. Several researchers demonstrated that tools such as X-ray Diffraction (XRD) or Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC) are valuable tools for defining and verifying the homogenization step [3,4,5,6,7,8,9]. Improvement of microstructure and mechanical properties of homogenized aluminum 2219 is well documented. Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) images from a study examining aluminum 2219 with varying amounts of copper show change in the morphology of grain boundaries after homogenizing in Figure 1.

The table below lists the results of Wang et al. who examined nonhomogenized and homogenized 2219, which were forged and treated to the T6 temper. The homogenized 2219 is clearly superior [3].

Thermomechanical Deformation Mechanical deformation such as forging — specifically, upset forging — and rolling, followed by solution treatment and aging, have been shown to drastically improve the aluminum 2219 microstructure by creating well distributed smaller-sized Al2Cu particles and significantly smaller grains leading to improved and less anisotropic mechanical properties. In one example of many studies, superior mechanical and microstructural properties were developed with a higher temperature multidirectional forging at 510 °C followed by warm rolling at 240 °C.

The upset forging and rolling followed by solution treatment and aging led to significantly reduced area fraction of coarse Al2Cu particles (5.5% to 1.0%) due to dissolution into the matrix. Grain size was reduced (230 micrometers to 58.6 micrometers) through increased storage energy and nucleation from the lower temperature rolling. Lastly, a uniformly distributed θ’ phase was increased by 118%.  These changes in microstructure led to better strength, elongation and fracture properties[10].

Recommendation/Guidance
Homogenization after conventional direct chill casting is imperative to optimize the final properties of aluminum 2219 and should be explicitly included in procurement specifications. In addition, verification of effectiveness of the homogenization step is also recommended and could include before and after micrographs, DSC or XRD measurements. The initial micrographs are useful to verify a high-quality ingot. Multi-directional deformation is also important to aid fracturing of coarse particles, distribution of the Al2Cu and intermetallic phases, recrystallization, and nucleation of new grains leading to improved mechanical properties.

References
1. NASA-CR-74545

2. NASA-CR-123777

 3. Wang et al., Materials 2018, 11, 914.

4. Chen et al., Metals 2020, 10, 197.

5. Zhang et al., Journal of Materials Research and Technology 2023, 27, 7470.

6. Gupta et al., Canadian Metallurgical Quarterly, 2006, 45, No. 3.

7. Xu et al., Metals 2021, 11, 174.

8. Zhang et al., Advanced Engineering Materials, 2024, 26.

9. Lin et al., Materials 2023, 16, 433.

10. Zhang et al., Journal of Materials Research and Technology 2023, 22, 1136.

11. NASA-TM-20230018439 12. NASA-TM-20240000329

Anthropic has committed $11.6 billion over seven years to Akamai's cloud infrastructure, a bet on CPUs that could grow to about $20 billion, and in an unusual arrangement, Akamai is giving Anthropic a potential stake of up to 5% of its stock that grows as Anthropic spends more.

Mark Wahlberg joins Bruce K. Lee at Disrupt to discuss investing, entrepreneurship, healthcare, wellness, and building businesses.

The funding, which comes from Third Point, Nvidia, and others, will fuel the company's massive AI data center buildout.

Muju Earth Technologies has developed a deceptively simply pod that can save farmers money while improving crop yields.

The findings highlight how AI-generated and vibe-coded apps can spill and expose users' data when not configured or secured properly.