Cold Fusion

[iPeppers]

What's the story behind this discovery news article?

 

They seem to claim that cold fusion is possible. I will make a wild guess and say that most people here would tell me the opposite. Why? What are the hurdles or snags in cold fusion? And do you think the scientists talked about in the article believe that it is possible?

[SkepticLance]

You would be correct about the scepticism. There are two reasons for the general disbelief.

1. Previously claimed evidence of cold fusion has not been replicated by others repeating the experiments.

2. There is no mechanism known by which this process can occur.

 

In spite of that, a small minority of enthusiasts continues to carry out experiments, hoping to prove cold fusion. In spite of lots of effort in that direction, evidence has remained scanty, to say the least. Still, if it happened, and could be turned into a practical energy device, it would revolutionise civilisation. Probably too much to hope for. Don't hold your breath!

[insane_alien]

well, it is theoretically possible. all you have to do is get the nuclei close enough together without using heat to overcome electrostatic repulsion.

 

this would require orders of magnitude more than a quadrillion atmospheres, which presents its own problems.

[bascule]

Holy smokes, another claim of cold fusion!

 

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5j2QobOQnlULUZ7oalSRUVjnlHjng

 

How's about I just skip straight to the peer review?

 

Paul Padley, a physicist at Rice University who reviewed Mosier-Boss's published work, said the study did not provide a plausible explanation of how cold fusion could take place in the conditions described.

 

"It fails to provide a theoretical rationale to explain how fusion could occur at room temperatures. And in its analysis, the research paper fails to exclude other sources for the production of neutrons," he told the Houston Chronicle.

 

"The whole point of fusion is, you're bringing things of like charge together. As we all know, like things repel, and you have to overcome that repulsion somehow."

 

But Steven Krivit, editor of the New Energy Times, said the study was "big" and could open a new scientific field.

 

The neutrons produced in the experiments "may not be caused by fusion but perhaps some new, unknown nuclear process," added Krivit, who has monitored cold fusion studies for the past 20 years.

 

"We're talking about a new field of science that's a hybrid between chemistry and physics."

 

This kind of sounds like the reporter interviewed a scientist and a nutter. The scientist's outlook on this... not so positive. But the nutter is all about it!

 

"New field of science that's a hybrid between chemistry and physics?" WTF as if there isn't huge overlap between those fields already. Here's the guy's web site: http://www.newenergytimes.com/ Sure looks like a nutter to me...

 

Here's a much better NewScientist article on the subject:

 

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16820-neutron-tracks-revive-hopes-for-cold-fusion.html

 

 

And here's their paper:

 

http://www.springerlink.com/content/022501181p3h764l/

 

Apparently this announcement was made at the same conference where Fleischmann and Pons announced their cold fusion "results", 20 years ago to the day.

Edited March 25, 2009 by bascule

[bascule]

Whoops, it would appear I posted a duplicate thread:

 

http://www.scienceforums.net/forum/showthread.php?t=39461

 

Perhaps a mod would like to merge them

 

Mod note: Done

Edited March 27, 2009 by swansont
add mod note

[cameron marical]

so what are the ways people are trying to force nuclei together? any new ones?

[bascule]

On a note completely unrelated to this particular event, I've often wondered if nanomachines could just use mechanical force to shove individual pairs of nuclei together.

[Sisyphus]

On a note completely unrelated to this particular event, I've often wondered if nanomachines could just use mechanical force to shove individual pairs of nuclei together.

 

Why would a nanomachine have an easier time doing this than any other machine?

[bascule]

Why would a nanomachine have an easier time doing this than any other machine?

 

Because a nanomachine could operate on individual pairs of nuclei at a time, fusing them with mechanical force (possibly in conjunction with magnetic fields), as opposed to trying to create high pressure/temperature conditions where incomprehensible numbers of nuclei fuse spontaneously.

[Sisyphus]

Right, but you'd be using incomprehensible numbers of atoms (i.e., big machines) to create that pressure. What I mean is why would you expect a nanomachine to be able to exert what would be, relative to its size, an enormous force needed to overcome repulsion? How does scaling it down make it easier than macro-scale machines mashing stuff together really hard?

[bascule]

What I mean is why would you expect a nanomachine to be able to exert what would be, relative to its size, an enormous force needed to overcome repulsion?

 

I would expect that a nanoscale machine could completely confine the two nucleii (possibly within a magnetic field) and be able to precisely direct the force needed to push the two together, whereas macroscale machines will be substantially sloppier in how the force is applied.

[SkepticLance]

Another claimed approach to nuclear fusion, which so far has been fraudulent, is sonoluminescence.

http://pubs.acs.org/cen/news/86/i30/8630notw2.html

[J'Dona]

Perhaps I could find the answer myself with a little more investigation or imagination, but in this case I'd invite anyone to illuminate me ...

 

What is the practical point of cold fusion if it doesn't put out sufficient thermal energy to drive a generator of meaningful size?

 

If the energy liberated did indeed manifest as excess heat in the sample (e.g. in claims of bubble implosions or similar), surely this just shows that it provides no alternative method to generate power? In which case, given a fair lack of many other applications (beyond a very limited range of enriching certain elements), why does cold fusion elicit such excitement?

[Mr Skeptic]

On a note completely unrelated to this particular event, I've often wondered if nanomachines could just use mechanical force to shove individual pairs of nuclei together.

 

At first thought, this seemed silly to me, but then maybe it is reasonable. However, as I understand it nanotechnology already has enough trouble being rigid, and hydrogen has this tendency to pass through things, so it might not be possible to physically push them together. On the other hand, it seems that something as simple as a muon can catalyze fusion at cryogenic temperatures, so maybe some type of catalyst is possible. Maybe its possible to design a nanomachine designed to guide hydrogen atoms into a headon collision.

[gre]

Has any experimental data been released? They are calling it LENR (low energy nuclear reaction) not "cold fusion", probably since "cold fusion" has a black-eye. And according to standard belief there is no such thing as "LENR" .. So, who knows what they did.

[GDG]

On a note completely unrelated to this particular event, I've often wondered if nanomachines could just use mechanical force to shove individual pairs of nuclei together.

 

The problem is that the only things we have to make nanomachines out of are atoms. How is a molecule, held together by chemical bonds, possibly going to force two nuclei together forcefully enough to overcome electostatic repulsion? I suspect that the nanomachine (or the surface of any macromachine) will deform long before you get close to achieving fusion. It would be like trying to crush a diamond between two sticks of butter. I doubt that this is something that will ever work.

---

Merged post follows:

Consecutive posts merged

At first thought, this seemed silly to me, but then maybe it is reasonable. However, as I understand it nanotechnology already has enough trouble being rigid, and hydrogen has this tendency to pass through things, so it might not be possible to physically push them together. On the other hand, it seems that something as simple as a muon can catalyze fusion at cryogenic temperatures, so maybe some type of catalyst is possible. Maybe its possible to design a nanomachine designed to guide hydrogen atoms into a headon collision.

 

A head-on collision by itself would not be enough to cause fusion unless the particles are moving extremely fast: this is why serious attempts at fusion use extremely high temperatures (plasma tokamak) and/or pressures (laser implosion). If the nuclei have enough energy to fuse, they're not going to be deflected by a mere nanomachine. It would be like trying to focus machine gun bullets using paper towels. Chemical bonds just are not going to survive under those conditions.

[bascule]

The problem is that the only things we have to make nanomachines out of are atoms. How is a molecule, held together by chemical bonds, possibly going to force two nuclei together forcefully enough to overcome electostatic repulsion? I suspect that the nanomachine (or the surface of any macromachine) will deform long before you get close to achieving fusion. It would be like trying to crush a diamond between two sticks of butter. I doubt that this is something that will ever work.

 

All it has to overcome is the force of electrostatic repulsion, using... the force of electrostatic repulsion.

 

I don't see why your analogy replies. I'd substitute using a machine built out of steel to bend steel.

[GDG]

All it has to overcome is the force of electrostatic repulsion, using... the force of electrostatic repulsion.

 

I don't see why your analogy replies. I'd substitute using a machine built out of steel to bend steel.

 

The energy of chemical bonds is orders of magnitude weaker than nuclear binding. Consider also the distance scales: chemical bonds (interatomic spacing) is on the order of 1-2 Angstroms (10^-10 m), whereas the size of the nucleus is on the order of 10^-15 m. Since electrostatic repulsion scales on the inverse square law, the repulsion at the nuclear scale will be (10^5)^2 times as strong. This is a very steep potential at those scales.

 

Not going to happen.

[gre]

Have there been any details published regarding the US Navy's experiment on LENR or 'cold fusion'? What does it have to do with 'nano machines'?

[Mr Skeptic]

Have there been any details published regarding the US Navy's experiment on LENR or 'cold fusion'? What does it have to do with 'nano machines'?

 

Both are cool

[gre]

 

This is the best description I could find .. about 13:00 into the video, the SPAWAR scientist talks about what they did.

[iNow]

60 Minutes had a piece last weekend about Cold Fusion. Easily accessible to laymen, but interesting all the same:

 

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=4955212n

[Ophiolite]

Scepticism is an essential part of science. It is important that the scepticism have a sound basis. That does not seem to be the case with several of the sceptical views posted in this thread. They seem to be based upon one or more of these points:

 

1. Previous claims of cold fusion were found to be faulty. This is irrelevant. All that matters is the rigour of the experimental method and the soundness of the logic.

2. No mechanism has been offered to explain how the cold fusion could occur. This is a very weak objection. Formation of hypotheses requires observation. Sound observations do not require, though they should ultimately lead to, explanations of the observations.

3. Posters are unable to imagine any mechanism that could be responsible. Arguments from personal incredulity have no basis whatsoever.

 

In consequence of these three points I find no reason to reject this latest research as flawed, which is what the majority of posters appear to be doing.

Edited April 24, 2009 by Ophiolite
Clarifiy via formatting.

[SH3RL0CK]

In consequence of these three points I find no reason to reject this latest research as flawed, which is what the majority of posters appear to be doing.

 

 

Those are good points you bring up. However, there are valid scientific reasons why cold fusion should be impossible (at least in human timescales) as already discussed in the thread. Thus, when a claim of cold fusion is made, it should be immediately considered dubious because this contradicts known science. It is much more plausable that the observations for cold fusion are incorrect than the very many more observations which lead to our current understanding of nuclear physics.

 

Should cold fusion be actually proven to work, we would have to rethink a very considerable portion of what we believe to be true regarding nuclear science.

[gre]

Those are good points you bring up. However, there are valid scientific reasons why cold fusion should be impossible (at least in human timescales) as already discussed in the thread. Thus, when a claim of cold fusion is made, it should be immediately considered dubious because this contradicts known science. It is much more plausable that the observations for cold fusion are incorrect than the very many more observations which lead to our current understanding of nuclear physics.

 

Should cold fusion be actually proven to work, we would have to rethink a very considerable portion of what we believe to be true regarding nuclear science.

 

True, but it still seems strange most physicists will dismiss these experiments as none sense without ever looking into their validity.

 

 

Anyone have more details on the SPAWAR cold fusion experiments? All I could gather was they used special Pd-D electrodes (plated in the presence of Deuterium gas) for electrolysis on heavy water, and the process would not work with normal tap water.