User:SCZenz/Cold fusion intro
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Cold fusion is the term for a nuclear fusion reaction that takes place at or near room temperature instead of the millions of degrees required for plasma fusion reactions. The term was first used in the scientific literature by Johann Rafelski and Steven E. Jones of Brigham Young University in 1986 to refer to muon-catalyzed fusion, but today it is used primarily to refer to low energy nuclear reactions (LENR) — or chemically-assisted nuclear reactions (CANR) — which were first investigated by Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann at the University of Utah.
The possibility of LENR reactions is rejected by many if not most scientists. The first such experiment was published in March of 1989, and was front-page news for some time. The initial experiments reported (details)
[citation needed] Electrolytic cells, gas loading, and ion implantation have been used to generate unexplained power. The term "cold nuclear fusion" was first used in the scientific literature by Johann Rafelski and Steven E. Jones of Brigham Young University in 1986.
Low energy nuclear reactions have been dismissed by some critics as an example of pathological science, and an idea that would not go away, long after the majority of scientists dismissed it as wrong. Researchers continue to report generation of excess heat. While there is little acceptance of the field in the popular press today, over 3,000 cold fusion papers have been published including about 1,000 in mainstream, peer-reviewed journals. [1] Several peer-reviewed papers continue to be published every year. [2] In 2004, the US Department of Energy set up a panel to review 15 years of research in cold fusion. About half of the reviewing scientists indicated they were somewhat convinced that power is actually generated in these experiments, and that this power cannot be attributed to ordinary chemical or solid state sources. Two thirds of the scientists in the panel were somewhat convinced that the excess generation of power did not have a nuclear origin, but were unable to explain it. They favored continued research, although not in a large federally funded program.
Popular science journals such as Scientific American [3] [4] and Nature have often attacked the subject, for example in March and October 2005 respectively, and most other journals reject papers on the subject without reviewing them. In January 2006, the Washington Post, Time magazine, the Guardian, and other major newspapers and magazines attacked cold fusion, claiming it was a "scientific misdeed" debunked in 1989. [5]
A cheap and simple process of nuclear fusion could have substantial economic impact. If low energy cold fusion can be made practical, it might produce very little nuclear radiation from small devices, whereas plasma fusion tokamak reactors can only be made on larger scales, and produce substantial amounts of radiation.
