Journal of Applied Physics, NASA, and the Hydrino

Erik Baard writes "I wanted to bring you the last on a story that was slashdotted in June: NASA's investigation of the 'hydrino' rocket. In June I reported for wired.com that the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts was funding a six-month study of rockets propeled by plasmas created by BlackLight Power Inc. The company claims that energy is released when it shrinks hydrogen atoms, bringing the electron closer into its nucleus than thought possible. Here's the scoop: the researcher told NASA that *something* was indeed generating plasmas with more kinetic energy than would be expected for the power input. And the kicker is that BlackLight founder Randell Mills scored a paper about his plasmas in the mainstream Journal of Applied Physics -- after a few years of following this bizarre startup, that floored me." Here's the Village Voice story with these updates.

Comments

Oh no! It IS possible!

[Goalie_Ca]

Better recalculate those schrodinger equations. Lets add more variables this time :D

Re:Suggestion

[Evil Adrian]

They should add a new line to the Slashdot FAQ: "You should only read this site if you payed attention in science class." ...and if you paid attention in English class.

Should be lots of skepticm

[dagg]

There are many reasons to be skeptical of this project:

• The company is named "Blacklight Power".
• The guy looks funny in that lab jacket.
• Most of the scientific community finds these theories "crackpot ideas".
• He's raised 30 million dollars.

--No money raised for this...

Re:Should be lots of skepticm

[kmellis]

"He's raised 30 million dollars." 99.99% of which did not come from Slashdot users.

All right. Fess up. Who gave this guy 3,000 dollars?

Re:Suggestion

[mz001b]

payed is a perfectly cromulent word.

Re:reputed journal... Maybe....

[Rothfuss]

Blah blah blah...

You, an uncredentialed /.er who goes by the name Pap Legba, have just dismissed the peer review process of scientific journals, comparing "science mags" to "game review mags."

I considered arguing your pseudo-point, perhaps suggesting that you read the actual journal article, which you might find to be intelligent and thorough, and to provide sufficient information to duplicate the experiment in your own lab, which is expected in peer review journals.

I also considered mentioning that the people that review these articles, although quite busy, are well versed in their respective fields.

But that would only serve to validate your ridiculous point.

So instead I will directly attack your apparent lack of intelligence.

You are an idiot.

-Rothfuss

Re:Suggestion

[TheOnlyCoolTim]

But he used it with such a noble spirit that it still embiggens his post.

Tim

Re:reputed journal... Maybe....

[MarkusQ]

You, an uncredentialed /.er who goes by the name Pap Legba, have just dismissed the peer review process of scientific journals, comparing "science mags" to "game review mags."

Uh, just to clarify: we aren't talking about a scientific journal here. The original article explicitly stated that it was the "Journal of Applied Physics."

-- MarkusQ

Richard P. Feynman,

[sohp]

Sorry, until we have the current living heir to the intellectual tradition and rigor of Richard P. Feynman examine and confirm these claims, it's just so much snake oil.