NSF Funded Research News

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 19-Aug-2025 09:10 ET (19-Aug-2025 13:10 GMT/UTC)

12-Aug-2025

We now have the math to describe ‘matrix tides’ and other complex wave patterns seen in Qiantang River

University at Buffalo
Peer-Reviewed Publication

New research by University at Buffalo and University of Colorado Boulder researchers has uncovered and characterized novel two-dimensional wave patterns — waves that propagate along two directions — whether they are in water or other settings like plasmas and condensed matter. 

Funder

U.S. National Science Foundation

12-Aug-2025

Black metal could give a heavy boost to solar power generation

University of Rochester
Peer-Reviewed Publication

In a study published in Light: Science and Applications, the team described their unique spectral engineering and thermal management methods to create a solar thermoelectric generator device that generates 15 times more power than previous devices.

Journal

Light Science & Applications

Funder

U.S. National Science Foundation

12-Aug-2025

Sun to study software vulnerability detection & remediation

George Mason University
Grant and Award Announcement

Kun Sun, Professor, Information Sciences and Technology, College of Engineering and Computing (CEC), is set to receive funding for the project: “Collaborative Research: CIRC: Planning-C: An Infrastructure and Dataset for Research in Software Vulnerability Detection and Remediation.” 

Funder

U.S. National Science Foundation

11-Aug-2025

Fresh fossil finds in Africa shed light on the era before Earth’s largest mass extinction

University of Washington
Peer-Reviewed Publication

An international team of paleontologists, led by researchers at the University of Washington and the Field Museum of Natural History, is identifying the animals that thrived in southern Pangea — the planet’s single supercontinent at the time — just before the so-called “Great Dying” wiped out about 70% of terrestrial species, and an even larger fraction of marine ones.

Journal

Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology

Funder

U.S. National Science Foundation, National Geographic Society

11-Aug-2025

Is the 'love hormone,' oxytocin, also the 'friendship hormone'?

University of California - Berkeley
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A UC Berkeley study found that social prairie voles lacking the receptor for oxytocin are slow to form friendships, are less motivated to reach their friends, and are less aggressive toward and avoidant of unfamiliar peers. This points toward a role for oxytocin in both the ‘approach’ and ‘avoid’ sides of maintaining specific friendships, affecting selectivity.

Journal

Current Biology

Funder

NIH/National Institutes of Health, U.S. National Science Foundation

11-Aug-2025

Why oxytocin treatments for social behavior are inconsistent

Society for Neuroscience
Peer-Reviewed Publication

When rhesus monkeys are already socially motivated, oxytocin prolongs their social behavior by promoting activity within and communication between two brain areas.

Journal

JNeurosci

Funder

U.S. National Science Foundation, NIH/National Institute of Mental Health

8-Aug-2025

New class of protein misfolding simulated in high definition

Penn State
Peer-Reviewed Publication

New computer simulations that model every atom of a protein as it folds into its final three-dimensional form support the existence of a recently identified type of protein misfolding.

Journal

Science Advances

Funder

U.S. National Science Foundation, NIH/National Institutes of Health, National Science Centre, Poland

7-Aug-2025

Consider the chemistry of your quantum materials, say researchers at Columbia

Columbia University
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A team of chemists and physicists at Columbia University have discovered that atomic orbitals, not just a material's underlying crystal lattice, can act a new source of electron frustration that researchers can now tap to create quantum behaviors.

Journal

Nature Physics

Funder

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

6-Aug-2025

Neighbors matter: Community cohesion boosts disaster resilience, Texas A&M study finds

Texas A&M University
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A study from the Texas A&M University School of Public Health sheds new light on the relationship between community cohesion prior to a natural disaster and resilience after one, with possible policy applications for public health and emergency preparedness practitioners.

Journal

Disaster Medicine and Public Health Preparedness

Funder

Texas A&M Superfund Research Center, U.S. National Science Foundation

5-Aug-2025

New pathways could turn carbon dioxide into valuable fuels and chemicals

Texas A&M University

Rather than focusing solely on carbon emissions, chemical engineers at Texas A&M are emphasizing the idea of circularity, where CO2 becomes a resource.

Journal

Chem Catalysis

Funder

U.S. National Science Foundation, Governor's University Research Initiative, Oak Ridge Associated Universities