<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><item href="/news/ahmed-earns-600000-nsf-award-to-advance-ai-hardware-development.php" dsn="blogs"><pubDate>08/17/2026</pubDate><title>Ahmed earns $600,000 NSF award to advance AI hardware development</title><main-featured>true</main-featured><category-featured>true</category-featured><summary>As the 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.</summary><image><img src="/news/_images/louisiana-tech-logo-on-blue-background.jpg" alt="Louisiana Tech logo"/></image><tags><tag>Engineering and Science</tag><tag>Faculty/Staff</tag></tags></item>