New evidence supporting cold fusion claims was presented at last week’s American Chemical Society (ACS) meeting. And the results have reignited the long-simmering controversy about the viability of low temperature fusion energy generation.
Using what is considered the standard tabletop fusion reactor experimental setup, a group of researchers from the U.S. Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center ran their equipment for several weeks. In such experiments, current is passed (via electrodes) through a solution of palladium and heavy water in an attempt to initiate a fusion reaction.
A nuclear particle detector was used to determine whether a fusion reaction occurred. Specifically, researchers used a plastic material (CR-39, which is used in eyeglass lenses) to look for distinctively shaped tracks that indicate high-energy neutrons interacted with the detector.
Sure enough, a track was recorded. The Navy researchers content that the track indicates a fusion reaction had taken place in their experimental reactor. However, others contend there are other possibilities as to the origin of high-energy neutrons. For instance, naturally occurring cosmic-rays are a source of high-energy neutrons and the detector may have simply picked up one generated from this mechanism.
Coincidentally, last week’s ACS event was held on the 20th anniversary of the Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann announcement of their cold fusion experiment. Pons’ and Fleischmann’s work was panned and could not be reproduced.
While the Navy research does not resolve the cold fusion controversy, unlike the Pons and Fleischmann work, the new results have been reproduced.
Additionally, cold fusion proponents note that over the last 20 years the field has been quite active, with many peer-reviewed papers published supporting or demonstrating cold fusion (on a small scale) in lab experiments. Incidentally, over the 20 years since the first announcement, the cold fusion name describing this field has morphed into low-energy nuclear reactions.
Last week’s news will certainly not set the controversy to rest. However, perhaps such experiments will help remove the pseudo-science stigma from this work and open the field up to more theoretical and experimental examination. That would be the only way to put the controversy to rest one way or another.
The trouble seems to be that it has since that research first appeared it has been shown that the pits and tracks found can have causes other than nuclear.
Exactly. And that's the problem. Worse, this experiment is repeatable. Others have gotten the same results. But the question remains: Are the tracks a byproduct of a reaction in the chamber or simply the result of another naturally occurring phenomenon.
