NSF Funded Research News

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 15-Oct-2025 06:11 ET (15-Oct-2025 10:11 GMT/UTC)

15-Apr-2025

Uncovering the hidden cost of water splitting

Northwestern University
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Water molecules flip their orientation before splitting into hydrogen and oxygen. These acrobatics require significant energy, leading to the reaction’s inefficiency. Researchers quantified the precise energy costs of flipping. Efficiency is significantly affected by the water’s pH levels.

Journal

Nature Communications

Funder

DOE/US Department of Energy, U.S. National Science Foundation, Air Force Office of Scientific Research

15-Apr-2025

Study finds flaws in tools used to enforce online ad standards

North Carolina State University
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A new study finds about 10% of websites that claim to comply with online advertising standards are running ads that violate those standards. The finding tells researchers that the ad-filtering rules browser extensions use to enforce the standards have flaws advertisers can take advantage of to display non-compliant ads.

Funder

U.S. National Science Foundation

Meeting

ACM Web Conference

15-Apr-2025

Penn engineers first to train AI at lightspeed

University of Pennsylvania School of Engineering and Applied Science
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Penn Engineers have developed the first programmable chip that can train nonlinear neural networks using light — a breakthrough that could dramatically speed up AI training, reduce energy use and even pave the way for fully light-powered computers.

Journal

Nature Photonics

Funder

Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Office of Naval Research, U.S. National Science Foundation, U.S. National Science Foundation, U.S. National Science Foundation, U.S. National Science Foundation, U.S. National Science Foundation