Jean-Paul Biberian have published a new volume of JCMNS, volume 20.
The first article is a negative replication of Dennis Letts dual-laser experiment, with a credible artifact explanation reproduced.
Attempted Replication of Excess Heat in the Letts Dual-laser Experiment
Mason J. Guffey, Yang Tang and P.J. King : ReResearch LLC, 3519 Jack Northrop Ave., Hawthorne, CA 90250, USA
By attempting a nearly exact replication of prior published work, we test the claim that release of non-chemical excess heat from loaded palladium deuteride (PdD) can be triggered by the application of two laser beams with wavelengths selected at specific difference frequencies around 8, 15 and 20 THz. No significant excess heat events were observed in 231 laser triggered trials across 9 cathode runs. The average excess heat rate observed from all runs was 6.1 ± 21.6 mW with ∼10 W of input electrical power. We found no evidence of excess heat on the order of 100 mW reported by Letts. Calorimetry artifacts stemming from apparatus design issues often exceeded 100 mW and contributed to larger-than-desired uncertainties on individual excess heat measurements.
A good example of the interest of replicating, and the risk of artifact... Future will say, but currently skepticism is dominant.
on Vortex, Jed Rothwell make the following comment
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The first paper, by Guffey, is depressing. It appears to show that Letts is wrong about the dual laser experiments. Many papers report failed replications, meaning no heat. This paper is worse. It reports a similar calorimeter that not only failed to produce real it, it produced artifacts that looked like real heat at a substantially high level, up to around 100 mW. When a replication attempt fails to produce heat, you might suspect the materials or techniques are at fault. When it produces what looks like heat, but the author shows is actually an artifact, that calls into question the original claim.
Another artcle by Swartz experiment the role of phonons in LENR materials (I don't catch much), including NANOR devices.
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Optical Detection of Phonon Gain Distinguishes an Active Cold Fusion/LANR component
Mitchell R. Swartz∗
JET Energy Inc., Wellesley Hills, MA 02148, USA
Successful cold fusion is heralded by a large, if not quite abnormal, increase in the anti-Stokes to Stokes (aS/S) ratio in coherent multi-wavelength optical reflection volume-enhanced electric-driven spectroscopy (CMORE-spectroscopy). This distinguishing phonon gain is not seen in the “off” state or the avalanche (undesirable) mode. It heralds seven acoustic phonons assisting nuclear
reactions and a core peak calculated Stokes temperature of circa 1645 K.
As I understand it is experiment results giving hints on theory.
Peter Halgelstein write an article about hydrogen in palladium
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Models for the Phase Diagram of Palladium Hydride Including O-site and T-site Occupation
Peter L. Hagelstein∗
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA
Early statistical mechanics models for palladium hydride allowed for a good description of the phase diagram based on a simple parameterization of the O-site energy. In this work we study generalizations of these models to include higher-order dependence on loading, temperature-dependent O-site energies, and also to include T-site occupation. Experimental data sets for 10 isotherms were assembled, and augmented with additional extrapolated points for the low-pressure α-phase region as well as the high pressure β-phase region. Loading-dependent O-site energies are optimized by minimizing the mean square error in the chemical potential between the model and data set. The resulting models give a good match to the phase diagram. If the O-site energy is allowed to be temperature dependent then the fit is better, but the resulting optimum is a mathematical optimum not so closely connected with the physical system. Models were studied in which O-site and T-site occupation occurs. When optimized these models are able to provide a good match to the phase diagram. When the O-site to T-site excitation energy is fixed according to estimates developed in earlier studies, the resulting temperature-dependent O-site energies are physically plausible. When the excitation energy are optimized together with the O-site energy, the resulting optimum is a mathematical one much less connected to the physical system.
An earlier analysis of solubility in the α-phase led to a strong argument that T-site occupation occurs in palladium hydride and in palladium deuteriude; the present study supports this conclusion based on an independent data set.
Edmund Storms write an article about his replication of PdD LENR in electrolysis, and the impact of temperature and loading.
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Anomalous Energy Produced by PdD
Edmund Storms∗ LENRGY LLC, Santa Fe, NM 87501, USA
Abstract
Two samples of commercial Pd from the same batch were reacted with D using the electrolytic method and found to produce
sustained excess power and energy. The effects of temperature, applied current, and D/Pd ratio on the amount of excess power were
studied.
..
Conclusions
The applied electrolytic current and the resulting average D/Pd ratio have very little if any effect on the amount of excess power produced by a nuclear-active sample of PdD. The only variable of importance is temperature of the PdD.
The temperature effect shows an activation energy similar to that involved in the diffusion of D in PdD. This behavior suggests the heat energy is generated in isolated regions, such as the proposed NAE, to which the deuterium fuel has to diffuse.
Electrolysis apparently produces significant deuterium concentration gradients in the material. In addition, reaction with D causes significant expansion, distortion in shape, and changes in surface morphology. Repeated partial loading and unloading are found necessary to initiate excess power production. This process, combined with the composition gradients and shape changes, would produce stress that is proposed to create the NAE.
A critical average D/Pd ratio does not appear to be required to initiate excess power production. Once initiated, excess power will continue at average compositions as low as D/Pd = 0.15.
In this study, as much as 27.5 kJ (1719 kJ/mol Pd) of excess energy was produced without any electrolytic power being applied and this energy production showed no sign of stopping for 1100 min. In other words, the sample produced a (power out)/(power in) ratio equal to infinity for an extended time.
If a sample is found to produce excess energy, most other samples in the batch of Pd will show the same ability, which suggests the critical features are present throughout the batch. The ability of Pd to become nuclear active is not affected by it being heated at 900◦C in air for as long as 5 h or by removing about 1 µm from the surface using HNO3.
Apparently, the potentially nuclear-active region is a stable variation of the normal palladium structure located below the surface that needs to be modified in some way to become active.
This is more detailed and more structured than the progress reports on www.lenrexplained.com
He continues with an article more focused on theory research:
How Basic Behavior of LENR can Guide A Search for an Explanation
Edmund Storms∗ LENRGY LLC, Santa Fe, NM 87501, USA
The LENR effect was identified 27 years ago by Profs. Fleischmann and Pons as production of extra energy in a normal chemical structure, in this case PdD. Over a thousand published papers now support the discovery and the energy is shown to result from fusion of hydrogen isotopes without the need to apply energy and without energetic radiation being produced. By conventional standards, the claims are impossible. Nevertheless, a new phenomenon has been discovered requiring acceptance and understanding. The major behaviors and their present understanding are described in this paper and are used to suggest how an effective explanation might be constructed. Once again, science has been forced to either reject the obvious or accept the impossible. In this case, the normal skepticism needs to be ignored in order to determine if this promised energy source is real and can provide the ideal energy so critically needed.
Peter Hagelstein continue with a more theoretical article :
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Quantum Composites: A Review, and New Results for Models for Condensed Matter Nuclear Science
Peter L. Hagelstein∗
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA
A composite is made up of constituent particles; the center of mass dynamics is that of a single particle, and the composite can have many internal states and degrees of freedom. The notion of a quantum composite is foundational to atomic, molecular, nuclear and particle physics; in our view it is also foundational to condensed matter nuclear science. It comes as a surprise that there do not appear to be review papers that discuss quantum composites. Here we consider elementary particles models, which are used to model composites; the most widely used example is that of the Dirac phenomenology for protons and neutrons. Quantum composite models can be developed from many-particle models, in some cases simply by rewriting in terms of center of mass and relative operators, and in other cases through a reduction or transformation. We have proposed models for anomalies in condensed matter nuclear science which rely heavily on the notion of a relativistic quantum composite. In the nonrelativistic case there is a clean separation of center of mass and internal degrees of freedom, so that any coupling between them must occur through external field interactions. The relativistic composite has a sizeable coupling between the center of mass motion and internal degrees of freedom, which we have proposed is responsible for the anomalies in condensed matter nuclear science. We have developed a new model in which the center of mass dynamics is modeled as nonrelativistic, but the internal structure is kept relativistic; this kind of model is much better adapted to problems in condensed matter nuclear science. Our approach has been strongly criticized, since in a Poincaré invariant theory the center of mass motion separates from the internal degrees of freedom in free space. We are able to rotate out the strongest part of this coupling in free space, consistent with Poincaré invariance. However, in the lattice the problem is in general much more complicated, and more powerful tools are required to diagonalize this relativistic coupling. The spin-boson type of models that we have considered previously for this are the simplest idealized models that can be diagonalized; they describe rich dynamics not present in the free-space version of the problem.
