Cold Fusion in a Breadbox Instead of a Bottle

rawbytes writes "For the last few years, mentioning cold fusion around scientists has been a little like mentioning Bigfoot or UFO sightings. After the 1989 announcement of fusion in a bottle and the subsequent retraction, the whole idea of cold fusion seemed a bit beyond the pale. But that's all about to change. A very reputable, very careful group of scientists at the University of Los Angeles (Brian Naranjo, Jim Gimzewski, Seth Putterman) has initiated a fusion reaction using a laboratory device that's not much bigger than a breadbox, and works at roughly room temperature. This time, it looks like the real thing." From the article: "Scientists have gotten fusion to occur in the laboratory before, but for the most part, they've tried to mimic conditions inside the sun by whipping hydrogen gas up to extreme temperatures or slamming atoms together in particle accelerators. Both of those options require huge energies and gigantic equipment, not the sort of stuff easily available to build a generator. Is there any way of getting protons close enough together for fusion to occur that doesnt require the energy output of a large city to make it happen? The answer, it turns out, is yes."

Comments

I'll believe it...

[Dirtside]

...when I see multiple peer-reviewed articles reporting that others have been able to duplicate this experiment. :P

Re:I'll believe it...

[babbage]

I'll believe it... ...when I see multiple peer-reviewed articles reporting that others have been able to duplicate this experiment. :P

From the article:

This experiment has been repeated successfully and other scientists have reviewed the results: it looks like the real thing this time.

*ahem*

From the comment:

I'll believe it... ...when I see multiple peer-reviewed articles reporting that others have been able to duplicate this experiment. :P

In other words, an article in the Christian Science Monitor -- a fine newspaper, but not a scientific journal by any stretch -- in which the reporter casually asserts without citation that "other scientists" have "reviewed" the results, does not an independent confirmation make.

You can't just wave your hands and say "oh yeah, others have repeated it, others have reviewed it, we're done here." Who are these others? What exactly did they find, and how closely did everything match the original inputs & outputs? What kind of "review" did they do? We're still just dealing with anecdotes and hearsay, not scientific analysis.

What the grandparent poster implicitly asked for, reasonably, was [presumably refereed] articles in [presumably credible] scientific journals documented that other [presumably non-pseudo-science] researchers had taken the procedure described here, replicated the experimental apparatus, conducted their own trial of the experiment, and then verified that the results they obtained were in agreement with the ones predicted by the original researchers. If all that happens, then, and only then, are we getting somewhere.

Until then, this doesn't sound like much more than yet another cold fusion pipe dream.

Re:The 2nd To Last Paragraph Is The Most Important

[Soybean47]

It's not super clear, but I don't think it's a contradiction. Saying "don't expect fusion to become readily available" doesn't mean that it won't, just that you shouldn't expect it. Saying "it really may not be long" doesn't mean it will happen soon, just that it could.

The summary of that is, "readily available fusion could happen soon, but don't count on it."

Re:The 2nd To Last Paragraph Is The Most Important

[Skye16]

you forgot the most important part: "For the time being". That means that, in the future (perhaps not very long), things could change. She doesn't contradict yourself unless you take words out of context. :]

Re:Who's the idiot moderating this as...

[jrockway]

I don't mind dupes. The whining about dupes I could live without though.

Seriously. If you see a dupe, don't read it. I didn't see this the first and second times, so this is cool for me :)