ACS c&en : Cold fusion died 25 years ago, but the research lives on

Quote from AlainCo

When you hear a scientist cry us a river to stop searching, you know there is a problem.

It would take more than one to "know there is a problem." I would not mistake a few immature grad students or close for the mainstream, which mostly is ignorant of cold fusion developments, and then someone shoves Rossi claims in their face, and they might react, eh? The Eddington quote is very interesting and I took the opportunity to get to know him a little better.

On Observation, Experiment, Theory, Trust and Belief.

Quote from AlainCo

One reason I am convinced LENR is real, despite lack of theory, is because the data have a structure, a structure based on loading, metallurgy, temperature, contamination... and not only on instrumentation choices.

Yes. So accustomed are we to having what might be called "deep theory" that we overlook the beginnings of theory. We have a theory. Cold fusion, at least the initial discovery as confirmed, is the conversion of deuterium to helium, mechanism unknown. This theory leads to quantitative predictions, it's falsifiable, etc.

We have other theories: the reaction is surface, it happens in cracks, we could go into more details of Storms theory. My sense of his theory is that his "nuclear mechanism" is defective, and I argued that he should not push it, because it is likely to turn physicists off, and what we need is to create avenues of approach for physicist, not roadblocks. That argument is only really about political practicality, not "truth." Otherwise his "explanation" is quite good, and parts of it are testable. The evidence for "surface reaction" is quite good (it's based on helium). Cracks are plausible. Vacancies are not, my opinion, out of the running, even though Storms presents some decent arguments against vacancies, as such.

Storms theory is intimately observation-based. Most cold fusion theory is an attempt to explain "how could this happen?" in superficial terms, i.e., how could the Coulomb barrier be overcome (which assumes that it applies)? This was natural, and represented a willingness to look at what might be possible. So there are many theories that come up with some *possible way that fusion could happen at low temperatures." That does not show that the way imagined is the actual way, and it irritates Storms no end that many of the theories neglect experimental fact. However, in each case, it could simply be that the theory is incomplete.

As Storms theory is incomplete. When one looks closely at the "core physics" of his theory, it's not there. It's simply a rough idea, and it requires nuclear states, below-ground, that have never been observed, and that should be observable. Storms applies the argument that runs like, "If everything possible has been ruled out, then the impossible must be happening." Or something like that. However, we never know "everything possible," and, yes, it's quite possible that if someone proposes the True Theory, it will look impossible. And Storms rules out many theories based on what he thinks is their impossibilitiy, such as BECs at room temperature.

Of course BECs at "room temperature" are impossible, but the "local temperature" of two deuterium molecules in conifinement could be far lower than the bulk temperature. Consider the recent announcement of ice at 100 C., with water confined in carbon nanotubes. A BEC is like an ultra-frozen state. I have not studied that ice report, but I find it utterly unsurprising. A cold fusion BEC could be undetectable, because the rate of formation and the lifetime would be very low and short. But it only takes a femtosecond, per Takahashi's calculations.

To create and vet cold fusion theories, we probably need much more data. Sometimes that data will fall out of purely observational and exploratory studies, and sometimes out of specific tests of specific theories. Key, though, is More Observation of More Experiments. Key for that is, mostly, money. Key for money is establishing plausible reality of an effect to be explored, plus long-term possible practical use.

Quote from AlainCo

Steven Krivit reports the author ignoring his remarks
news.newenergytimes.net/2016/1…ters-cold-fusion-article/

I notice two ideas he promote :
LENR is not fusion,
Rossi's is not a credible player (I'm polite here)

I won't be. Krivit, initially successful in connecting with the CMNS community, became a yellow journalist, focusing on real or imagined scandal.

Yes, he claims that "LENR is not fusion," but his understanding of the science and the experimental record is weak and colored yellow. At the same time as he started attacking almost the entire field as being deluded or worse by the fusion idea, accusing McKubre and Violante of fabricating data inconvenient for his own conspiracy theory, he started promoting Widom-Larsen theory, which has zero experimental evidence produced, only post-hoc analysis with Rube Goldberg explanations that cover why effects that WL theory would naturally predict are missing. Any possible flaw, real or imagined, in any paper critical of W-L theory is jumped on as proof that it's not "scientific."

His major theme, though, is almost always STEVE KRIVIT. So, here the "story" is that "THEY DIDN'T LISTEN TO ME!"

The man has become a complete embarrassment. He had a nonprofit at one point (recently dissolved, apparently). He had reputable board members. They resigned, in at least one case, we know that one was asked to resign because he had questioned Krivit's behavior, in a context where the board member was trying to explain a totally embarrassing comment Krivit had made in a radio or other broadcast interview.

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and there is a shocking fact, that we, LENR-Forum, are cited...
Is it deserved? We should be serious guys (and ladies).

What happens here might make a difference.

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Now personally what are my positions ? not far .
With more softness, I am still convinced by the critics of Industrial Heat , until reverted. If Rossi win I'll call him Donald.

Convinced by the criticisms of Rossi by IH? I.e., in the lawsuit?

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About LENR I share the similar opinion that LENR is not cold Coulomb nucleus rape as hot fusion strawmanized cold fusion, but something between romantic seduction and Saturday night disco effect. I am convinced by the critics on Widom-Larsen-Srivastava-Swain weak interaction LENR theory, and much less by those on Hydroton. What I feel is that as said Julian Swinger, Peter Hagelstein, Luca Gamberale, ... it is something collective.

For me, the bottom line is that the reaction is not understood. However ... we know, based on the preponderance of the evidence, that in the Fleischmann-Pons experiment, heat and helium are being produced in the ratio that would be predicted if the reaction were a kind of deuterium fusion that does not lose energy as radiation or other products, but all the released energy ends up as heat. This is prima facie evidence for a kind of fusion, that might proceed through unidentified intermediary products, mechanism still unknown.

(An example, probably not the reality in itself, would be double-deuterium molecular fusion through tunneling within a Bose-Einsitein Condensate, to generate 8Be, which would promptly fission to form two helium nuclei, releasing 23.8 MeV/4He, which is within experimental error of the experimental finding. Why not the reality in itself? Because those nuclei would probably be pretty hot, the mechanism Takahashi proposes for energy dissipation, a burst of low-energy photons as nuclear emissions down a series of excited nuclear states, is speculative and possibly weak, much more study is needed, and that would still leave each helium nucleus with about 45 KeV, too much, considering the Hagelstein limit of 20 KeV for charged-particle emissions.)

This would be fusion by result, and not necessarily "d-d fusion," which Krivit seems to believe everyone has in mind, which he is then rejecting, yet, linguistically, fusion could refer to any process whereby lower-Z elements are converted to higher-Z and energy. Krivit is phenomenally naive and few in the field, any more, take him seriously. It's very likely that the author of that article was informed of this.

Quote from Shane D.

I don't know if anyone noticed that Brian Ahern wrote a "Letter to the Editor" today, in response? Nothing said about Krivit's style, but he did say he will try and replicate the Thermacore 1996 "run-away", with the help of some Thermacore employees who were there. Good to see him back in the fray.

It's worth reproducing the Ahern Letter. Quoted not for profit, for purposes of critique.

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Dec. 3, 2016To the Editor:

I was associated with NiH experiments conducted by Thermacore Corp working with Randall Mills in 1993-1996. They measued long term excess power otputs as high as 97 watts.

Chuck Haldeman from MIT Lincoln Laboratory replicated the Thermacore work in 1995 and got significant excess heat production. Unfortunately, Chuck was unable to scale the exceed power beyond 10 watts.

Chuck retired from Lincoln and I too left government service and had no further contact with Thermacore. Only recently, we learned that Thermacore made one final experiment in late 1996 to assess the role of Nickel surface area and reaction temperature.

They loaded 5 pounds of nickel powder together with 1/2 pound of K2CO3 mixed together. They used K2CO3 powder as a means of introducing the potassium catalytic activity. They introduced hydrogen gas at 30 psi instead of generating hydrogen with electrolysis This allowed them to increase the temperature of the reaction vessel.

This experiment experienced a massive runaway reaction that melted the 50 pound, stainless steel reaction vessel. This heat release exceeded any potential chemical energy by more than a factor of ten.

We are currently setting up to replicate this runaway reaction with the guidance of Thermacore personnel associated with the 1996 runaway experiment.

A repeat of the heat release has the potential to open up the LENR field and allow for experiments that will elucidate the underlying reasons for the energy.

Brian Ahern, Acton, MA

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How long ago was that improbable story, Abd? And why has it not been repeated? If I could do that, I would repeat it the next day and the one after that. Then, I'd invite Bill Gates' people to see it and I'd make billions. It is a hallmark of scams and deceptions, including honest self-deceptions, that the authors seem not to understand the extreme consequences (good in this case) of their claims. So basically, I don't believe a word of it. BTW, wouldn't the military love a small nuclear reaction which is controllable and yields lot of thermal energy. Wow. They'd salivate a chance to fund it. If it worked, provably, of course. If not for a bomb, how about for powering a huge laser? And that was 1993 and nothing since. Wow.

If that's your big breakthrough, Abd, fuggit about it.

Please explain to me how something so simple to do and so hugely important and apparently known to quite a few people-- explain how that could go undeveloped and unrecognized by the mainstream from 1996 until now, 20 f'n years later? How is that possible?