As Louisiana Tech's College of Engineering and Science prepares to open its new privately funded 15-station NVIDIA AI Laboratory in Nethken Hall this fall, the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded $599,982 to Md Rubel Ahmed, Ph.D., assistant professor of computer science, for a three-year research project that will help translate advanced AI models to custom hardware/accelerators efficiently and correctly.
The award is the latest milestone in the college's growing investment in artificial intelligence research and education. Ahmed's project, titled Elements: Open Infrastructure for Automated Synthesis of AI Models to Hardware, supports research that will make it easier for scientists and engineers to transform artificial intelligence models into specialized computer hardware, helping accelerate innovation while reducing the time and complexity required to learn and develop next-generation AI hardware technologies.
"This project will make AI hardware design more accessible through an end-to-end open-source framework, enabling researchers beyond the traditional chip design community to develop AI hardware,” said Ahmed. “I am grateful to my collaborators at the University of Florida and the University of Central Florida and to my students for their invaluable contributions to this award."
While many people interact with AI through applications like virtual assistants or online search tools, those technologies rely on highly specialized computer hardware that determines how efficiently they operate.
"This funding coincides with an exciting time for the college," said Dr. Collin Wick, dean of the College of Engineering and Science. "Regardless of where anyone may stand on the issue of AI, it's here to stay, and it's incumbent upon us to leverage its capabilities and impact in engineering and science education."
Ahmed's research focuses on developing the tools and infrastructure that make next-generation AI systems faster, more efficient, and easier to build. His NSF-funded project addresses one of the biggest challenges in AI development: connecting AI software to the hardware realization that ultimately powers it.
Today, designing custom hardware for AI often requires multiple complex software tools and extensive engineering expertise. Ahmed's project will create an open, unified platform that automates much of that process while ensuring the resulting hardware remains accurate, efficient, and reliable. The research is creating a common semantic preserving "language" that allows software description of an AI model to be transformed into a specialized and optimized hardware implementation, making it easier for researchers and industry to develop faster, more energy-efficient AI systems.
The award underscores the College's expanding commitment to artificial intelligence. This fall, students and faculty will begin using the new NVIDIA AI Laboratory, which will provide advanced computing resources for instruction, research, and collaboration across engineering and science disciplines.
“The Computer Science program is excited to see Dr. Ahmed’s hard work and innovative research receive regional and national recognition through the awarding of this grant, said Dr. Ankunda Kiremire, senior lecturer and program chair of Computer Science. “This research, along with our upcoming AI lab and new AI/ML concentration, will help position our students and faculty to stay at the forefront of this rapidly evolving field. Together, these efforts will help ensure that our students are prepared for the changing demands of the AI industry and the opportunities that await them after graduation.”
Together with recent NSF-funded AI research in Industrial Engineering and the opening of the new NVIDIA AI Laboratory, this award reflects the College of Engineering and Science's strategic investment in artificial intelligence across multiple disciplines to ensure students have access to the advances transforming engineering, manufacturing, infrastructure, cybersecurity, and scientific discovery.