New theory may explain the notorious cold fusion experiment from two decades ago

Re:New theory may explain the notorious cold fusion experime... by InclinedPlane on Tuesday October 23, 2012 @04:44PM (#4690260)

I found this article to be overly simplistic in its explanations, here's the relevant paper if that helps (although it's still fairly impenetrable, but it does have more details): http://www.springerlink.com/content/77127077754p1788/fulltex...

Note that ultimately it still comes down to low-energy fusion, in this case it's the fusion of two neutrons and Li-6 into Beryllium-8 which then decays into He-4 nuclei. This is somewhat similar to the CNO cycle whereby you keep adding protons to C-12 and the subsequent products until ultimately you end up with C-12 again plus a He-4 nuclei, and a lot of fusion energy along the way.

Fortunately there are several clear-cut experiments that can be conducted to verify each element of this theory, so we should see some progress on this (one way or the other) in the coming years.

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Re:New theory may explain the notorious cold fusion experime... by uvdiv on Tuesday October 23, 2012 @05:04PM (#4690332)

It's a stretch of terminology to call neutron capture "fusion". This would make all (non-spontaneous) fission "fusion" too. Neutron capture is trivial to accomplish; there's no Coulomb barrier, as neutrons are uncharged. What's nontrivial, and an extraordinary-claim-demanding-extraordinary-evidence, is the production of free neutrons.

They don't have extraordinary evidence, or any evidence. Apparently I'm supposed be enthused about this future experiment, the outcome of which could be extraordinary, although there's no particular prior expectation for this.

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