O(δ), provided that we start with entropy \(k\ge m+2\log\left({1}/{\delta}\right)-O(1)\) . By a result of Radhakrishnan and Ta-Shma, this bound on k (called the “RT-bound- is also known to be tight in general. Unfortunately, in many situations the loss of \(2\log\left({1}/{\delta}\right)\) bits of entropy is unacceptable. This motivates the study KDFs with less entropy waste by placing some restrictions on the source X or the application P. In this work we obtain the following new positive and negative results in this regard: Efficient samplability of the source X does not help beat the RT-bound for general applications. This resolves the SRT (samplable RT) conjecture of Dachman-Soled et al. [DGKM12] in the affirmative, and also shows that the existence of computationally-secure extractors beating the RT-bound implies the existence of one-way functions. We continue in the line of work initiated by Barak et al. [BDK+11] and construct new information-theoretic KDFs which beat the RT-bound for large but restricted classes of applications. Specifically, we design efficient KDFs that work for all unpredictability applications P (e.g., signatures, MACs, one-way functions, etc.) and can either: (1) extract all of the entropy k--em class="a-plus-plus">m with a very modest security loss \(\delta'=O(\delta\cdot \log\left({1}/{\delta}\right))\) , or alternatively, (2) achieve essentially optimal security δ′--em class="a-plus-plus">O(δ) with a very modest entropy loss \(k \ge m+\log\!\log\left({1}/{\delta}\right)\) . In comparison, the best prior results from [BDK+11] for this class of applications would only guarantee \(\delta'=O(\sqrt{\delta})\) when k--em class="a-plus-plus">m, and would need \(k\ge m+\log\left({1}/{\delta}\right)\) to get δ′--em class="a-plus-plus">O(δ). The weaker bounds of [BDK+11] hold for a larger class of so-called “square-friendly-applications (which includes all unpredictability, but also some important indistinguishability, applications). Unfortunately, we show that these weaker bounds are tight for the larger class of applications. We abstract out a clean, information-theoretic notion of (k,δ,δ--unpredictability extractors, which guarantee “induced-security δ-for any δ-secure unpredictability application P, and characterize the parameters achievable for such unpredictability extractors. Of independent interest, we also relate this notion to the previously-known notion of (min-entropy) condensers, and improve the state-of-the-art parameters for such condensers." />