Canada and the World
Current Events with a Canadian Perspective
Last update
19 November 2010
Cold Fusion Experiments Continue
Twenty years ago two scientists said they had
produced cold nuclear fusion, but nobody could repeat
their work; now there is renewed interest in the science
Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons created enormous excitement on March 23, 1989 when they held a news conference in Salt Lake City, Utah to announce they had created a new energy source.
The two electrochemists said they had observed cold nuclear fusion in a glass jar
(shown here in a museum recreation). If their claim was borne out by other experimenters
the two men would have become fabulously rich, won Nobel Prizes, and turned into
the superstars of science.
At physicsworld.com physics writer David Voss tells the story of how others tried to copy what Fleischmann and Pons claimed to have done.
“In the rush to duplicate the cold-
Alas, when serious investigation took place the results of the Fleischmann and Pons experiment could not be reproduced.
Fusion Happens in Stars and Hydrogen Bombs
Fusion is what happens in our Sun. It involves the colliding of small atomic nuclei together to form larger ones. In the process huge amounts of energy are created. But, when positively charged nuclei meet up their natural inclination is to repel one another. To make them fuse temperatures measured in millions of degrees are needed.
If the fusion process could be achieved with the need for heat a virtually limitless
energy source would be created. However, as The Economist reported on the 20th anniversary
of the Fleischmann and Pons announcement, cold fusion, “has been cold-
Low-
The people still tinkering with cold fusion have buried the original description of it.
“Cold fusion” became so associated with junk science that the process is now referred
to as “low-
Most physicists say cold fusion is impossible; Dr. Pamela Boss begs to disagree with majority opinion. She joined other LENR researchers in presenting their latest findings at the annual meeting of the American Chemical Society in March 2009 and reported by Sciencedaily.com.
Dr. Boss works for the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Centre in San Diego, California. She says she has produced cold fusion by placing electrodes in an electrolyte made up of heavy water, which contains deuterium.
The Economist explained her work further: “Dr. Boss and her colleagues reported that one of the electrodes in their experiment got hot, an effect they attribute to fusion.
Most researchers in the field, though, do not accept that heat is sufficient evidence of fusion (if only because it was the basis of the Pons/Fleischmann claim).”
The researchers say they have proven that fusion has taken place by tracking neutrons
coming off the experiment in a plastic called CR-
No Proof of Cold Fusion
Frank Close remains unimpressed by the research. He is a professor of theoretical physics at the University of Oxford, and he says the experiments have not been independent verified.
According to a BBC News (March 2009) story, Professor Close said “that many inexplicable phenomena have arisen in the 20 years since Pons and Fleischmann’s announcement that have been tagged with the ‘cold fusion’ moniker.
‘If I come up with a weird phenomenon and call it cold fusion, I know that reporters will be interested. Convincing the scientific community is another matter entirely.’ ”
Image credit
Ryan Somma
Sources
“Whatever Happened to Cold Fusion?” David Voss, Physics World, March 1, 1999.
“Table-
“Cold Fusion Rebirth.” Science Daily, March 23, 2009
“Cold Fusion Debate Heats up again.” BBC News, March 23, 2009.
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Cold fusion “tempts people precisely because it's been pronounced impossible so many times—there's no better way to make your name in science than by demonstrating something impossible.”
Slate, July 2010