1989.04.01 / Tim Ihde /  Re: Noise please stop or use follow ups  was Re: Room Temperature fusion
     
Originally-From: tim@attdso.att.com (Tim J Ihde)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.research,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Noise please stop or use follow ups  was Re: Room Temperature fusion
Date: 1 Apr 89 17:23:00 GMT
Organization: AT&T DSO-HQ, Morristown, NJ

In article <3001@eos.UUCP> eugene@eos.UUCP (Eugene Miya) writes:
>This started as a discussion on room temp fusion (I'm reading in
>sci.research).  It has digressed into knit picking about non-fusion
>energy output.  No wonder why REAL physicists don't have the time to
>read news.
 
>Perhaps we need talk.energy (and talk.mass 8)?  This certainly
>isn't science anymore.
 
Alt.fusion has now been created; I suggest that this is the place for
most of the unsubstantiated statements, comments, and speculations.  New
newsbreaks to misc.headlines, and FACTS in sci.physics.  That should cut
the volume down in the sci groups to next to nothing . . .
 
Further discussion on THIS topic is directed to alt.fusion.
 
	tim
 
--
Tim J Ihde				INTERNET:   tim@attdso.att.com
(201) 898-6687				UUCP:	    att!attdso!tim
"Blimey - this redistribution of wealth is more complicated than I'd thought!"
		- Dennis Moore and various Presidents
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.01 / Gary Dare /  Re: Success with cold fusion reported
     
Originally-From: gld@CUNIXD.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU (Gary L Dare)
Newsgroups: misc.headlines,sci.misc,sci.research,sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Success with cold fusion reported
Date: 1 Apr 89 20:09:19 GMT
Organization: Columbia University, Dept. EE & CTR

At the Friday afternoon seminar on Cold Fusion at 501 Schermerhorn
(Columbia University), March 31st, a researcher from Brigham Young
University disclosed some results from their parallel efforts.  In the
process, he elaborated on ideas from a Soviet theoretician and even a
UCSD geologist (!), as well as cite previous research on this idea;
that is, those two guys mentioned in the papers were not geniuses
hiding in the closet coming out with a miracle (that's the illusion in
the press; we know better, right?).
 
The idea is that hydrogen atoms in heavy water, when brought into
close enough proximity to one another, will fuse as a result of
resonance from the interactions due to attractive forces.  The result
is Helium-3 (3He) and heat (energy).
 
Clues to the natural occurance of this phenomenom are the presence of
3He in metals from the preatomic age; the presence of this isotope in
modern metals is easily explainable from the increased levels due to
fallout since the 40's, but not so in ancient samurai swords.  Also,
the largest heat emissions are currently coming from shelves in the
Pacific Ocean.  Supposedly, natural fission of heavy matter in the
mantle and core are not sufficient to explain the amount of heat this
planet is generating (recent measurements of internal temperatures
have doubled since the IGY figures were made).  If sea water travels
into the interior through cavities and heavy isotopes are squeezed
close together by the enormous pressures, "piezofusion" will result.
These two clues inspired the BYU people to proceed in this direction.
Probably the same with the people cited in the NY Times.
 
The BYU people have demonstrated that this process indeed works, and
it yields . . . 10e-13 Watts of energy!  Certainly not the 4 W yield
for 1 W applied.
 
There were a few worried faces in the audience at the start of the
talk; at the end, the speaker received a raucous applause from the
audience.
 
gld
 
Disclaimer: please feel free to make any corrections to the above.
This is my best recollection, as I was squeezed under a row of seats
in the packed auditorium.
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ je me souviens ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 Gary L. Dare				> gld@eevlsi.ee.columbia.EDU
					> gld@cunixd.cc.columbia.EDU 	
	"I AM SALMAN RUSHDIE"		> gld@cunixc.BITNET
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.02 / Root Beer /  Fusion!
     
Originally-From: scott@zorch.UU.NET (Root Beer)
Newsgroups: alt.config,alt.fusion,news.groups,misc.headlines,sci.physics
sci.space.shuttle,rec.arts.sf-lovers
Subject: Fusion!
Date: 2 Apr 89 01:42:48 GMT
Organization: At Home; San Jose, CA

Well folks, it has been created:  alt.fusion.  The discussion and comments
that I had been seeing have been running about 10-1 in favor of creation.
Now that we've got the group, I hope that the fusion traffic will migrate
into it so I don't have to read size different groups in order to follow
the news.
 
For those people at sites that do not receive alt.fusion, I am providing
a gateway service - send mail to fusion-request@zorch.UU.NET to receive
digests of the contents of alt.fusion right in your very own mailbox :-)
Mail to fusion@zorch.UU.NET will be posted to alt.fusion.
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.01 / Ethan Vishniac /  Re: Success with cold fusion reported
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Success with cold fusion reported
Date: 1 Apr 89 22:12:09 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

As I understand it, from summaries of talks by Pons and Fleischmann
(not from their preprint) they have detected Helium4 as a byproduct
of their reaction.  Their estimation of production rates for
Helium3 and tritium are consistent with each other and much lower
(by about 10^9) than the rates required by the observed (or claimed)
energy production.  It therefore seems impossible to invoke any
reactions that use He3 or tritium as fuel to explain the energy
production.  This leaves 2D into He4, but under normal circumstances
this is down from the production rates for He3 and tritium by one
power of the fine structure constant since it involves emitting
another photon.  So we can either discard this possibility or choose
to believe in an enhancement of the rate due to the emission of
phonons with energies of several MeV.  (Incidentally, this makes
the fusion experiment the shrillest noise on Earth :-)).  I find
the idea of these "super-phonons" unlikely, but I'm hardly an
expert.
 
The only alternative that comes to mind is Li6 + D into 2He4.  This
has the virtue of avoiding nucleon emission in a reaction whose rate
is not obviously tied to the measured reaction rates for 2D into
something.  (Actually, I assume that this would make Be8 which
would decay into 2He4 on a time scale of 10^(-8?) seconds.)
This means the addition of LiOD to the solution is important for
physical, as opposed to chemical, reasons.  However, is it really
true that the lithium would dissolve into the palladium?  If not,
it is difficult to see how it could be involved.
 
The results of P and F still don't make much sense to me, but if
they are correct then this would seem like the most likely hypothesis
(which may be a dubious honor).  If this is right then it suggests
that lithium is about to become a little more expensive.  :-)
(sort of).
 
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
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------------------------------
1989.04.03 /  fusion@zorch.U /  Submission for Alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: fusion@zorch.UU.NET
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Submission for Alt.fusion
Date: 3 Apr 89 09:32:57 GMT
Organization: Alt.fusion/Mail Gateway

 
			The View from Here:
			___________________
 
Section 1: Foundations and Preconditions:
 
People have known for some time that some metals and alloys are
capable of storing remarkably large quantities of hydrogen at or near
room temperature. (Many, if not all, of the Platinum group; Titanium;
La5Ni are all examples. La5Ni, in fact, can store hydrogen at a
density that compares with the density of liquid hydrogen. Too bad
it's 5 Lanthanums to 1 Nickel.)
 
Here's a quote from something that was posted to sci.physics by
paf@unixprt.UUCP (Paul Fronberg), about Palladium:
 
 >
 >from "Guide to Uncommon metals" by Eric N. Simons
 >
 >One of the most remarkable properties of the metal is its ferocious
 >absorption of hydrogen, which it readily takes up, to the extent of
 >about 800 times its own volume at room temperature. This makes it
 >highly valuable as a diffusion barrier for the production of small
 >vlumes of extremely pure hydrogen.  In the same way septa or membranes
 >of palladium are now embodied in electrolytic cells for the separation
 >of hydrogen isotopes by electrolytic migration.
 >
 
It occurred to some people that if a metal were filled with Deuterium
rather than Protium, a modest number of fusion reactions could
conceivably occur.
 
There are three possible fusion reactions involving only Deuterium:
 
2 Deuteriums combine to form a Tritium and a Proton. The Tritium then
decays, with a halflife of something like 12.8 years, giving off an
electron and becoming Helium-3.
 
2 Deuteriums combine to form Helium-3 and a Neutron (the Neutron then
decays, with a halflife of something like 512 seconds, giving off an
electron and becoming a Proton)
 
2 Deuteriums combine to form Helium-4. This is rather much less
likely, as far as I know. It is, on the other hand, rather pleasant,
because it results only in charged particles, which are easily handled
and don't make the reactor 'hot'. (Neutrons are nasty critters.)
 
I believe that all of these give off gamma.
 
 
NOW: at least two groups proceed, apparently with private and/or
out-of-pocket funding, to build devices intended to explore the
possibility of fusion in metals at "room temperature". Some months go
by. The two Utah groups (Brigham Young University and University of
Utah (Pons) in collaboration with Birmingham, England (Fleischman))
obtain some results.  They both submit papers, which are scheduled for
publication in Nature or Journal of Electroanalytical Chemistry, in
late April and/or early May.
 
Meanwhile, word gets out. Oooops!
 
The two Utah groups are obliged to tell people what they have found.
There is at least one press conference, and (several?) internal
colloquia. FROM THESE ITEMS, and from preprints of the papers, various
things begin to emerge. Again, from a posting to sci.physics, this
time from ch-tkr@wasatch.UUCP (Timothy K Reynolds) [I've made minor
grammatical and spelling corrections]:
 
 >
 >Dr. Pons began with a brief history of the work began by
 >himself and Fleischman.  Initially, their interests were in
 >the development of a metallic hydrogen material for use as a
 >semiconductor.  They realized that immense pressures were
 >required in a lattice for this to occur.  However, they
 >theorized that it would be possible to bring about the
 >equivalent of this immense pressure by electrochemical
 >methods.  From these initial musings, they also considered
 >whether this "eletrochemical pressure" could be used to fuse
 >like nuclei (Deuterium).
 >
 >The initial experiment used a cube of Pd (size not stated) in D2O at
 >high current density (magnitude not stated).  A Geiger counter was used
 >to detect any radiation from the fusion reaction of D.  However no
 >radiation was detected.  The experiment was discontinued by reducing
 >the current density, and shortly thereafter (overnight I think is what
 >he said) the experimental apparatus was vaporized.  Left approximately
 >1/10 of the initial Pd.
 >
 
The researcher (Pons) stated that he and his group could not
convince themselves that any chemical energy source was
capable of providing the amount of energy released in their
experiments. If the description here is accurate, I could
well believe it!
 
Please note that the report says that they turned down the current
density fairly abruptly. Some sources have suggested that the
Deuterium inside the Palladium, no longer under electrochemical
pressure, attempted to leave, and in the process generated a region of
extremely high Deuterium density near the surface. Here, fusion
reactions presumably occurred, creating lots of neutrons, gamma, and
heat.  Whether the description is accurate, I couldn't say. There is
mention, toward the end of this summary, of a peculiar and extremely
exothermic phase transition in Palladium Hydrides...
 
Further items:
 
1) The Brigham Young University group finds some evidence for fusion
reactions. They do NOT see ANYTHING LIKE "breakeven", reporting
instead 10^-13 watts from their apparatus.
 
2) Again, quoting Timothy K Reynolds -
 
 >
 >Dr. Pons explained a control experiment where they used a closed
 >cell to detect tritium (else some tritium would be lost as by
 >exchange with D2O).  Tritium was detected, and its concentration
 >increased over time.  Also the neutron flux was measured at
 >10**4 n/s.  This is 3X higher than background and was considered
 >statistically significant.  However, the reactions to produce
 >tritium and 3He do not explain the amount of heat produced.
 >
 >The production rate of Tritium was found to match that of Neutrons.
 >
 
(As far as I understand it, the amount of heat corresponds to
about 10^9 times as many reactions as they have neutrons to
explain. That's a very large discrepancy.)
 
3) The Pons and Fleischman group detect Helium-4, but not
Helium-3. This is a mystery to me (and, as near as I understand
it, to them) at this time. (Further information later in this
summary.)
 
4) The University of Utah group reports one thermal runaway, as
mentioned above, and several other experiments which apparently
generated enough heat that they are unable to explain it away by any
non-thermonuclear means. This is odd. They say that they had to
'charge' the system for some months, and that once it was 'charged',
it gave off copious amounts of heat for about 120 hours. (For
'copious', one reads "on the order of 4 megajoules"...) They
calculated 26 watts/cc of electrode material. [Your humble
correspondent calculates this to mean that they had about 1/3 of a cc
of electrode. Could be off, though.]
 
As mentioned, the number of neutrons they are seeing, which as far as
they are aware should indicate the number of fusion reactions, is only
a billionth of what it would take to explain this amount of energy
output. Can you say "Oops!"? On the other hand, it clearly isn't
chemical. 26 watts/cc for 1 hour, I could maybe think about believing,
maybe, but not for 120, no way. 4 MILLION Joules out of some stupid
little piece of stuff that's not even a cubic centimeter? Give me a break!
 
Anybody have the data on the energy density of the Hydrogen spin-flip
reaction? Can that even conceivably be taking place here? (I think
Deuterium may not do that, but I'm too long out of school, and don't
really remember.)
 
5) The [fusion] reaction seems to be diffusion limited. Dr. Pons
apparently stated that the diffusion rate for Deuterium in Palladium
is on the order of 10^-7 cm^2/sec.
 
6) Several apparently unfounded rumors appear, to wit: that someone at
Los Alamos has duplicated the work, and lost a lab bench doing so,
that someone at Princeton has duplicated the work, that someone at
CalTech has duplicated the work. Los Alamos, at least, appears to have
denied the part of the rumor that mentions them. (This observer
believes that the 'lost lab bench' is probably the result of people
playing "telephone" about the thermal runaway in Utah.)
 
7) The price of Palladium appears to be climbing rapidly, unless we
are being bamboozled by April Fool reports.
 
 
SOME FURTHER EXPLANATIONS and OTHER ITEMS:
 
1) The electrolyte in the cells seems to have been heavy water
(typically 99.5% D2O, if you get high-quality stuff) with something
very much like household lye dissolved in it to make it conduct
electricity; the 'lye' actually has lithium instead of sodium, and has
deuterium instead of hydrogen, thus making it LiOD instead of NaOH.
 
If you want to think of that another way, it's D2O with one of the
Deuteriums replaced by a lithium. [I have one report that it was LiOH,
and one report that it was LiOD. Not that it makes a hell of a lot of
difference, at this level, as far as we know.]
 
2) If this observer correctly understands what is going on, both
groups report that the effect is a volumetric one; that is, the
reactions are NOT just taking place at the surface of the Palladium,
but involve Deuterium that has migrated INTO the crystal lattice.
Certainly, the Pons/Fleischman group reports that it's
volume-dependent. Moreover, the claim is that before the Palladium
surface is saturated with D, the D starts to migrate into the
interior. Odd, but not terribly so.
 
3)Quoting again from Timothy K Reynolds:
 
 >
 >Dr. Pons stated that the potential of this electrochemical
 >couple is 0.8V.  In terms of pressure to get the same degree of
 >difference in chemical potential = 10**27 atmospheres.
 >
 
Apparently, the 'electrochemical pressure' encourages considerable
amounts of Deuterium to take up residence inside the crystal lattice
of the Palladium. Still, the Palladium is a solid and it is fairly
dense, so it takes a fair amount of time for the Deuterium to get in
there.  People are reporting 'charging times' on the order of months.
 
4) DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME, KIDS!! Neutrons have this annoying
tendency to get into things and make them radioactive. If you want
your gonads to glow in the dark, make sure the benchtop is at the
right height for you...
 
5) Possible explanation for the presence of Helium-4: At least one
source has suggested that a fusion reaction involving one Deuterium
and one Lithium results in 2 Helium-4s, and could be going on. This
observer does not know whether Lithium can get inside the Palladium,
but it is always possible that it is merely getting into the surface,
and the reaction could be taking place there. (In the low atomic
numbers, many different reactions are known to take place. The
reaction that has been suggested for this explanation: Lithium-6 plus
Deuterium gives Beryllium-8, which then decays with remarkable
promptness [nanoseconds?] to 2 Helium-4s.)
 
6) Neutrons are not the only thing coming out of these reactions! Many
(if not all) of them give off Gamma as well. In fact, a distinctive
Gamma spectrum is one of the significant signatures for fusion, just
as a distinctive Neutron spectrum is.
 
7) Palladium seems to have a small cross-section for activation by
fast Neutrons, but could be activated by slower ('thermal') Neutrons
coming back out of the heavy water (which is a good Neutron moderator,
as witness the excellent Canadian fission reactor system, "CANDU").
Apparently the University of Utah group has not yet attempted to assay
their electrodes, to see whether any activation has taken place.
 
8) Again, quoting Timothy K Reynolds,
 
 >
 >No 2.45 MeV Neutrons were detected. [Dr. Pons] speculated that these
 >Neutrons may [have been] consumed by reactions with Lithium, as
 >follows:
 >
 >		7Li + n + 2.45MeV --> 3T + 3He + n
 >		6Li + n           --> 3T + 3He + 4.5MeV
 >
 
Not bad work, if you can get it. The concentration of Lithium in the
electrolyte has not, as far as I can tell, been specified. As to
isotopes, if my hazy memory is correct, there are roughly equal
amounts of Lithium-6 and Lithium-7 around in nature. I could be wrong
about that, though.
 
9) In a report from CERN, where Dr. Fleischman apparently lectured,
there is a claim that the Quantum Mechanics of the Deuterium
S-electron density is bizarre and not well understood. (Someone, I
don't know who, has speculated that the Deuterium exists within the
Palladium lattice as a sort of plasma. Nifty, if true.)
 
10) Also from CERN, fusion reactions and slightly different figures.
 
This information comes from
Jon Caves {world}!mcvax!cernavx!jon (or jon@cernvax.cern.ch)
Division DD
CERN CH-1211
Geneva 23
Switzerland.
 
 >
 >In the lattice the following nuclear reactions occur
 >
 >   2D + 2D -> 3T + 1H + 4.03MeV
 >
 >   2D + 2D -> 3He + n + 3.77Mev
 >
 >Their first experiment was with a palladium cube, this finished when
 >the cube ignited, in the nuclear sense. The conclusion of this is that
 >this reaction does not fail safe. When it starts to run hot it runs
 >very hot.  The cube almost burnt down their fume cupboard. But at
 >least the effects are not quite as serious as a meltdown of a fission
 >reactor.
 >
 >They then tried sheets before finally trying rods. These rods a 10cm
 >long and have diameters of 1mm ,2mm and 4mm. The best results are with
 >the 4mm rod therefore the reaction is dependent on volume as opposed
 >to surface area, it also seems to be dependant on temperature.
 >
 >After 100 hours the measured output was 5MJ/cm^3. They managed to
 >detect Neutrons, gamma, and a 5-fold increase in the [amount of]
 >Tritium in the heavy water. They didn't manage to get an energy
 >spectrum for the Neutrons.
 >
 
Too bad, too. Would have been nice to see a 4.5MeV peak...or maybe to
miss one.
 
11) If, in fact, something is catalyzing a T+p path about 10^9 times
as much as the 3He+n path, then the lack of Neutrons could be
explained fairly easily. But what would cause that much of a
differential? Moreover, I don't know whether they are detecting
appropriate Tritium levels.
 
12) Several people (Ron Merrill of BIX included) have mentioned a
curious fact: so far as we are currently aware, no attempt was made to
run a control with water instead of heavy water. It seems that the
researchers have decided that chemistry just cannot be responsible for
the amount of heat they are seeing. It would be nice, nonetheless, to
see a control hit!
 
13) The Brigham Young University people, who are seeing 10^-13 watts
output, apparently cannot understand the University of Utah results.
Different experimental setups, maybe? I still, alas, haven't seen
preprints of either paper, though I understand that scanned versions
of at least one are around the net somewhere.
 
14) Marvin Weinstein (BIX again, I think) mentions "...a known,
somewhat peculiar, phase transition [that] occurs in Palladium Hydride
(that is what this stuff is), which is powerfully exothermic and could
explain strange fires." Apparently occurs when the Palladium absorbs a
large amount of Hydrogen. Presumably also occurs with Deuterium?
 
Could this possibly explain the initial 'meltdown' in Utah? How
powerfully exothermic is this thing, and how does the Deuterium
version differ from the Protium version? All unknown to me at this
time.
 
15) Several people, including Leo Schwab, have wondered about the long
charging time. Can it be that the U of U people have invented a new
sort of battery? Seems unlikely - I would presume that much of the
heat generated in electrolysis, if that is indeed what is going on,
would just be conducted away, and that the excess O2 would be bubbled
off. This should be calculable, anyway. Lee Rimar (BIX) claims that in
fact you have to heat the Palladium to get the Hydrogen back out
(under ordinary circumstances), which argues against the 'battery'
hypothesis on at least one level.
 
 
			...and that's how it looks from here,
		Sunday night, 3 April 1989, on the Net, thriving
		on chaos and confusion. Hope this summary has
		been of some use to someone. Sorry it's so
		disorganized.
 
						Jon Singer
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------------------------------
1989.04.03 / Steven Bellovin /  reported confirmation of Pons/Fleischmann results
     
Originally-From: smb@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com (Steven M. Bellovin)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: reported confirmation of Pons/Fleischmann results
Date: 3 Apr 89 21:37:30 GMT
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill

According to the Associated Press and the New York Times, the Hungarian
news agency MTI has reported that two physicists at Lajos Kossuth University
have succeeded in reproducing the Pons/Fleischmann results.  The rector
of the university has confirmed the news agency report.
 
They claim to have observed neutron emission, and to have confirmed this
``by subsequent control tests''.
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------------------------------
1989.04.03 / Ethan Vishniac /  section of preprint from Fleischmann and Pons
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: section of preprint from Fleischmann and Pons
Date: 3 Apr 89 21:35:35 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

A few people have asked for copies of the preprint.  I have sent
them, but do not really have time to send more.  On the other hand
there has been a lot of questions regarding details of the experimental
setup.  I'm going to take a minute to quote liberally from the preprint
to pass on such information as it contains.  One thing it does not
contain is any clear information on control experiments that would
obviously eliminate chemical effects (such as using hydrogen instead
of deuterium).  That's not to say that they didn't do them, but for
whatever reason they choose not to mention them.
 
"In the work reported here D+ was compressed galvanostatically into
sheet, rod and cube samples of Pd from 0.1 M LiOD in 99.5% D2O + 0.5%
H20 solutions.  Electrode potentials were measured with respect to
a Pd-D reference electrode charged to the alpha-beta phase equilibrium.
We report here experiments of several kinds:
 
1) Calorimetric measurements of heat balances at low current densities
(=1.6mA cm^-1) were made using a 2mmx8cm Pd sheet cathode surrounded by
a large Pt sheet counter electrode.  Measurements were carried out in Dewar
dells maintained in large constant temperature water bath (300K), the
temperature inside the cell and of the water bath being monitored with
Beckman thermometers.  The HEavy Water Equivalent ofthe Dewar and contents
and the rate of Newton's law of cooling losses were determined by addition
of hot D2O and by following the cooling curves.
 
2) Calorimetric measurements at higher current densities were carried out
using 1, 2 and 4 mm diameterx 10 cm long Pd rods surrounded by a Pt wire
anode wound on a cage of glass rods.  The Dewars were fitted with resistance
heaters for the determination of Newton's law of cooling losses; temperatures
were measured using calibrated thermistors.  Experiments with rods up to 2cm
in diameter will be reported elsewhere.  Stirring in these experiments (and
in those listed under 1) was achieved, where necessary, by gas sparging
using electrolytically generated D2.  Measurements at the highest current
density reported here (512 mA cm^-2) were carried out using rods of 1.25
cm length;  the results given in Table 1 have been rescaled to those for rods
of 10 cm length.
 
3)  The spectrum of gamma rays emiited from the water bath due to the (n,gamma)
reaction 1H+n(2.45MeV) into 2D +gamma(2.5MeV) (vii) was determined using a
sodium iodide crystal scintillation detector and a Nuclear Data ND-6 High
Energy Spectrum Analyzer.  The spectrum was taken above the water immediately
surrounding an 0.8x10cm Pd-rod cathode charged to equilibrium; it was corrected
for background by subtracting the spectrum over a sink (containing identical
shielding materials) 10 m from the water bath.
 
    The neutron flux from a cell containing a 0.4x10cm Pd rod electrode was
measured using a Harwell Neutron Dose Equivalent Rate Monitor, Type 95/0949-5.
The counting efficiency of the Bonner-sphere type instrument for 2.5MeV
neutrons was estimated to be ~2.4x10^-4 and was further reduced by a factor
detector).  The background count was determined by making measurements 50m
from the laboratory containing the experiments: both locations were in the
basement fo a new building which is overlain by 5 floors of concrete.  In
view of the low counting efficiency, counting was carried out for 50 hours.
Measurements on a 0.4x10 cm rod electrode run at 64mA cm^-2 gave a neutron
count 3 times above that of the background.
 
4)  The rate of generation/accumulation of tritium was measured using similar
cells (test tubes sealed with Parafilm) containing 1 mm diameter x 10 cm
Pd rod electrodes.  Measurements on the D/T separation factor alone
were made using an identical cell containing a 1 mm diameter x 10 cm Pt
electrode (this measurement served as a blank as the H/D separation factors
on Pd and Pt are known to be closely similar).  1 mL samples of the electrolyte
were withdrawn at 2 day intervals, neutralized with potassium hydrogen
phthalate and the T-content was determined using Ready Gel liquid scintillation
"cocktail" and a Beckman LS 5000 TD counting system.  The counting
efficiency was determined to be about 45% using standard samples of
T-containing solutions.  The beta decay scintillation spectrum was
determined using the counting system.
 
    In these experiments standard additions of 1 mL of the electrolyte
were made following sampling.  Losses of D2O due to electrolysis in these
and all other experiments recorded here were made up using D2O alone.
A record of the volume of D2O additions was made for all the experiments.
 
    In all of the experiments reported here all connections were fitted
Kel-F caps and the caps were sealed to the glass cells using Parafilm.
 
   Results for the mass spectroscopy of the evolved gases and full
experimental detials for all the measurements will be given elsewhere."
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
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------------------------------
1989.04.03 / Walter Bright /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: bright@Data-IO.COM (Walter Bright)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 3 Apr 89 21:26:09 GMT
Organization: Data I/O Corporation; Redmond, WA

In article <1989Apr2.145310.29132@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester.e
u (Paul Dietz) writes:
>  Solid state fusion is immoral because...
>	[stuff deleted]
>Any others?  ;-)
 
You forgot the usual Luddite objections:
	1. It would cost thousands of jobs in the oil, gas & coal industries.
	2. There are unanswered questions about it.
	3. It represents *change*!
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------------------------------
1989.04.03 / Ted Acon /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: rebe@tank.uchicago.edu (Ted Acon)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 3 Apr 89 21:26:37 GMT
Organization: University of Chicago

In article <1694@thor.acc.stolaf.edu> larsonjs@thor.stolaf.edu
(James S. Larson @ St. Olaf College) writes:
>Has anyone given any thought to the reactions of the oil companies and OPEC
>countries to the new developments in fusion?  They must certainly realize that
>practical fusion will put them out of business.
 
I believe Robert Heinlein wrote a short story about this
very dilemma.  A man came up with a new power source and
found himself being forced out of production by various
legal and illegal means.
 
His solution: publicize.
 
He sent the plans for the energy source to every newspaper, magazine,
and journal he could think of.  Admittedly, putting an invention
into the public domain isn't profitable, but it would be the surest
means to actively advance it's utilization.
 
If anyone can remember the title of the story, tell me.
A copy should be in _The Past Beyond Tomorrow_, or whatever the
huge collection of his alternate timeline is called.
 
T_Deacon
rebe@tank.uchicago.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.03 / Wayne Schmidt /  Re: random thoughts on cold fusion
     
Originally-From: wayne-s@cis.ohio-state.edu (Wayne Schmidt)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: random thoughts on cold fusion
Date: 3 Apr 89 23:06:05 GMT

Just out of curiousity, what about instead of water how about Lithium?
If i remember correctly the decay process in lithium after being zotzed
with the neutrons (2.2 Mev?) yeilds deteurium.
 
if some containment system were devised for the lithium that allowed the
incident neutrons to impact on the "sheilding" could THIS be feasible?
 
wayne-s@cis.ohio-state.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.03 / Tim Ihde /  Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
     
Originally-From: tim@attdso.att.com (Tim J Ihde)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
Date: 3 Apr 89 20:14:38 GMT
Organization: AT&T DSO-HQ, Morristown, NJ

In article <Mar.29.01.31.38.1989.26758@caip.rutgers.edu> giraldi@caip.ru
gers.edu (John Giraldi) writes:
>>The low fuel weight would be a tremendous boon for aircraft, since the
>>biggest limiting factor in their present performance is the fuel
>>weight penalty. Cold fusion could improve aircraft cost performance by
>>at least an overall factor of two . . .
 
>I remember reading about the nuclear airplane where the Sec. of the
>AirForce warned the Sec. of the Navy that the AirForce would have
>a nuclear airplane in the sea before the Navy had a nuclear sub in
>the sky.
 
Seeing as that at this time he must have been talking about fission power,
I'm glad they never whent through with this plan.  Even those who accept
fission reactors as relativly safe should have problems with a fission
powered airplane.  A nuclear sub would just sink (bad enough), but can you
imagine a fission reactor in a plane strewn over several miles when the
thing crashes?  A plane crash is much more likely than a meltdown . . .
 
As for a cold fusion powered plane, the biggest difficulty is probably
lifting the weight of the shielding around the reaction (Commercial airline
studies have shown that pilots and passangers get cranky if exposed to
lethal amounts of neutrons :-)  If the reaction is powerful enough, then of
course this is not a problem.
 
Wait and see.
--
Tim J Ihde				INTERNET:   tim@attdso.att.com
(201) 898-6687				UUCP:	    att!attdso!tim
"Blimey - this redistribution of wealth is more complicated than I'd thought!"
		- Dennis Moore and various Presidents
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Brad Sherman /  Deja Vu
     
Originally-From: bks@alfa.berkeley.edu (Brad Sherman)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Deja Vu
Date: 4 Apr 89 00:42:19 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley

Didn't the "Skylark" series of novels by (Chemist) "Doc" E.E. Smith,
go sort of like this: Scientist puts wire in chemical bath, applies
current, wire flies through wall, interstellar travel?
 
	--Brad Sherman
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Scott Mueller /  Purpose of alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: scott@zorch.UU.NET (Scott Hazen Mueller)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Purpose of alt.fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 03:14:05 GMT
Organization: At Home; San Jose, CA

I have seen in passing a couple of articles questioning just what sort of
material should go into alt.fusion.  While a definitive answer is not possible,
as the proposer of alt.fusion I feel that I should take a crack at it.
 
For a start, I guess that we will have to trust our posters to have some
judgement.  I would prefer to see articles at the moderately technical and
lay level on the results in Utah.  I feel that those wishing to discuss
the truly esoteric details of the process can do so in sci.physics and
are welcome to congregate there.
 
Also, I would have to say that speculation on political, social and economic
aspects of fusion power are welcome here.  Think of it on the level of a
newsmagazine dedicated to the topic.  You would expect to see lead articles
on the latest results, leavened with pieces on the various potentials
brought to mind by events.  You would not expect to see vicious flaming,
though if you have ever read discussion of the place of GOTO in Communications
of the ACM, you would realize that disagreement is to be expected.
 
I can hardly expect to lay down the law with regard to alt.fusion; after all
this is the alt net.  However, I would like this group to be used in such a
manner that all who participate feel that is a valuable or even enjoyable
resource.
 
Thanks for listening, and thanks for your interest.
 
           \scott
 
--
Scott Hazen Mueller   scott@zorch.UU.NET
(408) 298-6213        (pyramid|tolerant|uunet)!zorch!scott
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Fen Labalme /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: flabalme@oracle.com (Fen Labalme)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 01:05:38 GMT
Organization: Oracle Corporation, Belmont, CA

In article <1989Apr3.151736.23062@cs.rochester.edu> yamauchi@cs.rocheste
.edu (Brian Yamauchi) writes:
> If Exxon, Gulf, Shell, etc. are smart...
 
Don't assume too much.  This is a serious newsgroup.  Get the facts.
--
Fen Labalme		Anarchist Information, Inc.	We Are Everywhere
fen@oracle.com		Oracle Corporation		The usual disclaimer
fen@hop.toad.com	Metaview Corporation		Makers of smarTV(tm)
sun!hoptoad!well!fen	Peace Conference host		Are You Kind?
Copyright 1989 Fen Labalme; you may redistribute only if your recipients may.
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------------------------------
1989.04.03 / Dave Newman /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: newman@ut-emx.UUCP (Dave Newman)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 3 Apr 89 23:26:46 GMT
Organization: UTexas Computation Center, Austin, Texas

 
I'm just a little peeved at the people who seem to feel
that all oil companies are EVIL.  From personal experience
I can safely say that they are just a bunch of people trying
to do a job - just like you or me. (Actually not me at the
moment ...)  So, the point is, just because the oil compay
folks can't defend themselves here is no reason to bash
them unmercifully.
 
As for the oil companies reactions to cold fusion, I think it
obviously comes down to a couple of questions: 1) after cold
fusion is commercial, will there still be a market for petrolium
products?  2) Is there some way that they can get in on the ground
floor of this new industry?  People have already argued that
there will be an oil industry for some time to come, and certainly
cheap electricity does not eliminate the other uses for oil
that we may be forgetting (plastics, etc.)  Also, the oil companies
have been looking at alternate energy sources for a long time.
The big solar power plant out in the Mojave desert is sponsored
in part by an oil company I believe, and I know that several
companies have been researching solar cells.
 
So, what with all of the above and the average person's basic
inertia, I suspect the oil companies or their direct descendents
will be around for a while.
 
>>Dave
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / L Chiaraviglio /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: chiaravi@silver.bacs.indiana.edu (Lucius Chiaraviglio)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 02:45:11 GMT
Organization: Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental
Biology at Indiana University, Bloomington

In article <1989Apr3.151736.23062@cs.rochester.edu> yamauchi@cs.rochester.edu
(Brian Yamauchi) writes:
>If Exxon, Gulf, Shell, etc. are smart, they will realize that they are
>not in the oil business, but the *energy* business, and they will
>start their own research programs immediately -- not to suppress
>fusion, but to market it.  The corporations that develop commercial
>fusion reactors will have a vast new market open to them.  The others
>will go the way of the huge, powerful, and now non-existent railroad
>companies who thought they were in the train business and should have
>realized that they were in the *transportation* business.
 
	Oh?  I guess Union Pacific, Southern Pacific, Illinois Central, Santa
Fe, Denver & Rio Grande, etc. don't really exist?  To think that the wool has
been pulled over my eyes all this time. . . :-)
 
	Let me point out that for a long time federal regulations hampered the
railroads from diversifying.  They realized this, and complained about it, but
government action was quite slow.  When they could diversify, many of them
did.  For instance, ever see a Santa Fe or Union Pacific truck trailer?
 
	As far as I know, the above comments do NOT apply to the oil companies
and the automotive industry, but they may apply to some extent to some other
energy companies.  Naturally, if the oil companies are absolutely convinced
that they aren't going to be able to make much more money out of oil, they
will try to co-opt fusion, but they will also try to milk every last bit of
money out of oil that they can (by slowing conversion if necessary) just
because that is a large amount of money and because converting to fusion would
mean that they would have to compete with everyone else.  Of course, the
government could do something stupid like preventing the oil companies from
having anything to do with fusion, thus giving them even more of a stake in
fighting it, or it could do something stupid like throwing it right into their
lap to keep them happy (this latter possibility is more likely, and would give
them a license to hold it up indefinitely, or at least until the oil runs
out).
 
--
|  Lucius Chiaraviglio   |  ARPA:  chiaravi@silver.bacs.indiana.edu
BITNET:  chiaravi@IUBACS.BITNET (IUBACS hoses From: fields; INCLUDE RET ADDR)
ARPA-gatewayed BITNET:      chiaravi%IUBACS.BITNET@vm.cc.purdue.edu
Alt ARPA-gatewayed BITNET:  chiaravi%IUBACS.BITNET@cunyvm.cuny.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Stewart Clamen /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: clamen@CLAMEN.AVALON.CS.CMU.EDU (Stewart Clamen)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 02:26:22 GMT
Organization: Carnegie Mellon University

In article <28300@apple.Apple.COM> jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer) writes:
 
   In article <CLAMEN.89Apr2224810@CLAMEN.CS.CMU.EDU>
   clamen@CS.CMU.EDU (Stewart Clamen) writes:
 
   >In article <1989Apr2.145310.29132@cs.rochester.edu>
   >dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz) writes:
   >
   >>
   >>   The four stages of reaction to a great invention:
   >>
   >>	   1. It's impossible.
   >>	   2. It's impractical.
   >>	   3. It's immoral.
   >>	   4. I said all along it was a great idea.
   >>
		   [material deleted for brevity]
   >>
   >>     Solid state fusion is immoral because...
   >
   >i. (One that I've though about a bit)  It will free people from their
   >   reliance on a central power supplier, thereby increasing
   >   self-sufficiency, and encouraging people (and terrorist groups) to
   >   become more anti-social in their behaviour.
   >
 
   I can readily agree about self-sufficiency, but you fail to support
   any causality for the other half. Just how is this supposed to happen?
   Can you cite instances in which people become more anti-social when
   they become more self-reliant? (I can't.) C'mon, now, give us some
   reason to believe the nasty claim! :-)
 
   >
   >   Relatedly, it decreases interdependance among nations, and thereby
   >   increases the likelihood of major, national conflicts.
   >
 
   Again, unsupported. Not only that, I don't buy it. Maybe it decreases
   _forced_ interdependency, but not _voluntary_ interdependency, and
   once again, you haven't bothered to make any case for your claimed
   causality.
 
When people want you to do something for them, they often find that
they are more successful when they are nice and friendly towards you.
I believe that this works similarly the diplomatic world.  If you want
something from a country, like oil, you have to be moderately friendly
to it, like send over an ambassador, sell them weapons, and accept
the ruling group's kids into Harvard.  If you suddenly find that your
trading partner has nothing to trade, you would be more apt to make
fun of his strange habits, since you would have less to lose if he got
angry with you.
 
Did the Western Allies and the Soviet Union join forces in WW2 because
they liked each other?  Why do you think the EEC is aiming at an open
market by 1992? because they are really psyched about getting
multilingual newscasts?  Are Americans really so pro-"Free Trade"
that they are willing to allow cheaper wood into their country,
costing American jobs?
 
Few countries decide their foreign policy based on ideology.  When two
countries join forces or begin to trade good and services, they do so
because they each see advantages to be gained on their side, either a
common enemy more likely to be defeated if attacked from the east and
west, or larger markets for THEIR OWN goods and services.  If energy
is free, Western (and Eastern) industrialized nations will not need to
trade as much with the often less-than-democratic OPEC nations of the
world, and won't.
 
   It has occurred to me that you may merely be playing devil's advocate
   here, but even if that's the case, you really want to do a righteous
   job of it. Don't just put up straw-men that we can knock down without
   any huffing and puffing.  :-)
 
I agree, but I thought that some others would come up with similar
points, so I didn't think I had to put much effort into elaborating.
 
 
 
--
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Stewart M. Clamen
School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA 15213-3890
 
INTERNET: clamen@CS.CMU.EDU
USENET:   ...!uunet!"clamen@cs.cmu.edu"
 
--
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / L Chiaraviglio /  Re: random thoughts on cold fusion
     
Originally-From: chiaravi@silver.bacs.indiana.edu (Lucius Chiaraviglio)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: random thoughts on cold fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 03:02:44 GMT
Organization: Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental
Biology at Indiana University, Bloomington

In article <15261@oddjob.UChicago.EDU> dmc@oddjob.uchicago.edu (Dave Cole)
writes:
>                                               [. . .]  In a fission reactor,
>the neutron flux which escapes the core is pretty much soaked up in the
>production of deuterium in the coolant water.  This is a problem for
>fission, since the deuterium is radioactive and useless.
 
	Deuterium is stable.  You must be thinking of tritium, which is the
radioactive isotope of hydrogen, and which you can get by hitting deuterium
with neutrons (amont other ways).
 
>                                                          But in a fusion
>reactor, we actually need deuterium for fuel!  So the deposition of neutrons
>in the coolant water might mean that the fusion reactor, once turned on,
>will run forever without ever needing refueling!  In practice that almost
>certainly won't be true, but having the fusion reactor produce enough
>deuterium to replace the amount consumed should easily be possible.
 
	Actually, this won't work, because you have to use at least 2
deuteriums for each neutron you get out.  It almost works for breeding
tritium from deuterium if you are using a deuterium + tritium fusion reaction;
the reason it doesn't quite work is because you will lose some of the neutrons
(that is, they get absorbed by something other than a deuterium nucleus), and
each deuterium + tritium reaction only produces 1 neutron.  To get more
tritium than you use you need a different kind of breeder reaction, such as
 
	(7)Li + n --> (4)He + (3)H + n
 
where the neutron comes out slower than it went in, but might be able to
participate in one or more additional reactions of the same kind if it was
originally going fast enough.  To get deuterium, you just purify it out of
ordinary water, where it is present in something like 1 part in 5000 (relative
to total hydrogen).
 
--
|  Lucius Chiaraviglio   |  ARPA:  chiaravi@silver.bacs.indiana.edu
BITNET:  chiaravi@IUBACS.BITNET (IUBACS hoses From: fields; INCLUDE RET ADDR)
ARPA-gatewayed BITNET:      chiaravi%IUBACS.BITNET@vm.cc.purdue.edu
Alt ARPA-gatewayed BITNET:  chiaravi%IUBACS.BITNET@cunyvm.cuny.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / S Chandrashekha /  excluding political discussions
     
Originally-From: chandy@brand.usc.edu (Sundaresan Chandrashekhar)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: excluding political discussions
Date: 4 Apr 89 04:32:13 GMT
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA

In article <8137@polya.Stanford.EDU> gangolli@wolvesden.Stanford.EDU
(Anil R. Gangolli) writes:
)In article <3688@mit-amt> jrd@media-lab.media.mit.edu (Jim Davis) writes:
)  )I beg you all, please keep this discussion to
)  )the physics of fusion, not the politics
)  )of fusion or the politics of science or
)  )science journalism.  I want to hear facts or
)  )*well informed* speculation.  ...
)
)I second his motion.  Please, let's get off things like fusion and
)OPEC, fusion and terrorism, fusion and anti-nuke groups, etc.  Please
)keep the discussion centered on fusion physics and technology. --anil.
 
	I oppose the motion. Science, politics and human welfare are closely
related. The scientist who concentrates on the technical/physical aspects of
 problem, and ignores the political, social and humanitarian aspects is
a danger to society. If the scientists who built the first atomic bomb had
thought about the consequences of their actions, the holocausts in Hiroshima
and Nagasaki may never have taken place. As engineers and scientists we have
a duty towards the human beings who are going to feel the impact of our
discoveries and inventions.
	I suggest that the keywords 'scientific', 'political', 'economic' etc.
be used to indicate the nature of the contents of all postings on this net.
------------
chandra.
 
send your flames to chandy@brand.usc.edu.
 
*********************************
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Joe Dellinger /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: joe@hanauma.stanford.edu (Joe Dellinger)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 08:25:40 GMT
Organization: Stanford University, Dept. of Geophysics

In article <11732@ut-emx.UUCP> newman@emx.UUCP (David Newman) writes:
>
>I'm just a little peeved at the people who seem to feel
>that all oil companies are EVIL.
 
Growing up in Texas, I've never figured out why the oil companies are so
widely hated either. My research group is closely tied to the Oil industry.
I would vouch that the oil industry is not particularly evil... although
they do have a strong attachment to 1970's model IBM mainframes (that's
why you don't see many postings from oil companies) that make them
at least a _little_ suspect...
 
The US oil companies ought to already be prepared for "death by fusion".
Why? All the cheap oil in the US is about gone anyway. It is useful
to keep looking for national security reasons, but Saudia Arabia has
single fields now with more than the entire remaining US reserves.
The US oil companies were already switching over to relying more on
distribution and retailing to make their money, even if fusion never
works at all!
\    /\    /\    /\/\/\/\/\/\/\.-.-.-.-.......___________
 \  /  \  /  \  /Dept of Geophysics, Stanford University \/\/\.-.-....___
  \/    \/    \/Joe Dellinger joe@hanauma.stanford.edu  apple!hanauma!joe\/\.-._
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Mark Thorson /  Re: Cold fusion as a terrorist weapon?
     
Originally-From: mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a terrorist weapon?
Date: 4 Apr 89 00:18:53 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

 
An ITT X-ray tube would be simpler, cheaper, no maintenance, and packs
lots of punch.  Some radioactive waste also would work.
 
However, if you are intent on using cold fusion for this purpose, might
I suggest taking a large oil-filled capacitor, cutting the top off with
a can opener, dumping out the oil, and unrolling the innards.  The innards
are very thin metal sheets separated by thin paper.  Soak the paper in solvent
to remove the oil.  Electroplate a heavy coating of palladium on the metal
sheets.  Re-roll and stuff back into the can.  Fill can with heavy water
and appropriate electrolytes.  Turn on power and book passage on next train
out of town.
 
The above assumes the best terrorist weapon would have a high surface ratio
for the palladium.  The recent disclosure of the self-destruction of a cube
of saturated palladium suggests a mechanism based on low surface area might
be more effective.  If this is the case, perhaps a cylinder with a cone-
shaped hollow space machined into one end might be used to create a
focussed "event", similar to the Munroe effect.
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Ric Helton /  Re: The deal
     
Originally-From: RCH@cup.portal.com (Ric C Helton)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: The deal
Date: 4 Apr 89 10:02:33 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

Aside from a quick blurb on CNN, I have not heard *anything* wrt cold
fusion in any other media, news channel or "real world" discussion.
Is this thing being covered at all by the general media?  CNN's announcer
gave the impression by his attitude, that this was another "Yawn,
perpetual motion hoax" type affair.....  Even so, you'd think the papers
would have *something* about it.
 
 -Ric Helton RCH@cup.portal.com
 -Freestyle BBS 404/546-8256
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Eric Fielding /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: eric@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu (Eric Fielding)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 13:34:57 GMT
Organization: Department of Geological Sciences, Cornell University

In a recent article bright@dataio.Data-IO.COM (Walter Bright) wrote:
>In article <1989Apr2.145310.29132@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rocheste
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Deborah Wilbert /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: dwilbert@bbn.com (Deborah Wilbert)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 15:02:05 GMT
Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc., Cambridge MA

 
The Economist, a well-respected British journal has a Science and Technology
section. The leading article in their last issue reported the Utah
announcement. Their article was a very good introductory-level explanation
of the experiment and the salient issues. The Economist is not main-stream
media by any means, but the announcement is being taken seriously in serious
circles.
cudkeys:
cuddy4 cudendwilbert cudfnDeborah cudlnWilbert cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Ethan Vishniac /  Li6 plus D as a candidate fusion reaction
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Li6 plus D as a candidate fusion reaction
Date: 4 Apr 89 15:24:58 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

After posting a note which suggested that *if* the results of Fleischmann
and Pons are indeed due to some fusion reaction that one possibility might
be Li6+D into Be8 into 2He4 I looked up a few relevant numbers.
(This being the net I am merely following custom in adhering to this order
of doing things.  :-))
 
A few comments appear in order.
 
First, my vague impression that Li6 was
the usual isotope of lithium was seriously wrong.  Lithium is mostly
Li7.  Li6 is not exactly rare, but it is less than 10 times as common
as Li7.
 
Second, comparing the masses of D, Li6 and Be8 one finds that D+Li6
has about 0.025 AMU to spare when making Be8, or about 25 MeV.
 
Third, the halflife of Be8 is a few times 10^-16 seconds, about
seven orders of magnitude faster than I had recalled.
 
In view of the relative scarcity of Li6, the difficulty getting
it into the Pd, and the relatively large difference between
the sum of the masses of  D and Li6 it would appear that this is
not a particularly promising mechanism.  In addition, the preprint
by Pons and Fleischmann states that losses of D2O due to electrolysis
were made up by the addition by D2O alone.  In other words, they were
not replacing the Li6 consumed, if Li6 was being consumed.  It is not
clear if this is a problem since the total energy available from the
Li6 present is *much* larger than the energy they claim to produce.
 
If Li6 + D *is* the mechanism by which all this energy is being produced
it can only mean that Be8 has an excited nuclear state with the correct
energy to make the reaction resonant.  This line of reasoning is
strikingly similar to the way the an excited state of C12 was deduced
from the requirement that 3He4 into C12 be reasonably efficient in Red Giants.
Of course, we know that C12 is abundant in the universe and that Red Giants
exist.  We don't know that F and P are actually producing abundant fusion
energy.
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
cudkeys:
cuddy4 cudenethan cudfnEthan cudlnVishniac cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Dale Cook /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: cook@pinocchio.Encore.COM (Dale C. Cook)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 16:26:54 GMT
Organization: Encore Computer Corp, Marlboro, MA

In article <1989Apr3.160534.25257@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester.e
u (Paul Dietz) writes:
>My impression was that alt.fusion was created as a ghetto for fluffy
>nonsense about fusion, and that sci.physics is the place to post more
>substantial stuff.  Or do we want a alt.fusion.nonsense?
>
The usual procedures for newsgroups is to collect all the commentary on a
subject initially and fragment the group when *demonstrated traffic* becomes
excessive.  20 or so postings a day is *far* from excessive!
 
Besides, I find all aspects of the fusion break through interesting.  The
bomb scientists have received heaps of abuse for NOT considering the
social consequences of their research.  Surely we are mature enough to
sift through all the material and choose what interests us.  Use a kill
file if you must.
 
 
 
	- Dale (N1US)	
INTERNET:	cook@pinocchio.encore.com
UUCP:		{buita || talcott || husc6 || bellcore} !encore!pinocchio!cook
cudkeys:
cuddy4 cudencook cudfnDale cudlnCook cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Jim Burke /  Re: random thoughts on cold fusion
     
Originally-From: jimb@mas.UUCP (Jim Burke)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: random thoughts on cold fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 16:24:33 GMT
Organization: Measurex Automation Systems, Cupertino CA

In article <1262@Portia.Stanford.EDU>, karish@forel.stanford.edu (Chuck Karish) writes:
> >     2)  Anyone know if there are steel-producing processes that don't
> >         use petrochemical coke? I.e., could you use fusion energy to do
> >         it, or would you have to keep smelly steel plants?
>
> 	Yes, there are direct-reduction steelmaking processes that don't
> 	use coke.  They're used mostly for specialty steels that can't
> 	tolerate certain impurities that come with the coke, but they're
> 	becoming more popular for less-exotic alloys.  If electricity
> 	ever does become too cheap to meter, it will be useful for
> 	steelmaking.
>
 
Basic Oxidation Furnaces (BOF's) blow oxygen into the bath of molten metal
to generate the heat required.  Electric Arc furnaces are also commercially
used today although they are expensive to run and are used more for the
specialty steels.  Coke is typically used to fuel blast furnaces because
it is cheaper than natural gas or oil so a fusion generated heat should
certainly be a good replacement.
 
Steel mills use an ENORMOUS amount of energy for secondary processing
after the steel has been made metalurgically.  These
processes include reheat furnaces and rolling mills.
 
Could the U.S. become a primary steel producing country again???  Stay
tuned.
 
 
--
Jim Burke (mas1!jimb)                   Measurex Automation Systems
{...}pyramid!voder!mas1!jimb            10411 Bubb Road
{...}apple.com!mas1!jimb                Cupertino, CA  95014
                                        (408) 973-1800 ext. 722
cudkeys:
cuddy4 cudenjimb cudfnJim cudlnBurke cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Larry Blair /  Re: short-term economic impact of cold fusion?
     
Originally-From: lmb@vicom.COM (Larry Blair)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: short-term economic impact of cold fusion?
Date: 4 Apr 89 19:16:21 GMT
Organization: VICOM Systems Inc., San Jose, CA

In article <8111@polya.Stanford.EDU> ginsberg@polya.Stanford.EDU
(Matthew L. Ginsberg) writes:
=The reason is that if the price of oil is clearly going to drop
=catastrophically in the next twenty years (say), then the price of
=oil is going to drop substantially almost immediately.  The reason
=is that the oil producers in the Middle East will no longer feel that
=they have to conserve their oil in order to preserve their money flow
=into the distant future.  As soon as it becomes clear that the price
=of oil is going down in the future, they will all start pumping as
=much as they can, as fast as they can.  And the price of oil will
=drop immediately, not twenty years from now.
 
No.  More oil output == less income - something the Saudis finally proved to
the rest of OPEC last year.  Unless you can increase your production by
10X (which even the Saudis can't), $20 oil pays better than $2 oil.
 
Oil will continue to be a valuable resource even if it not burned.  Besides,
if cold fusion really looks like it will come along, all "expensive"
exploration will stop and OPEC will have only game in town.
 
OK.  The $64 question.  It has been said that only palladium will allow the
kind of high density saturation that appears to be necessary.  Exactly how
abundant is palladium?  Is there enough that the world's energy needs could
be met, or are we talk about something that, like solar, is free power that
costs too much.  Before you flame me, I'm talking orders of magnitude here.
I know the process will be drastically improved.  Btw, what's happening to
the price of palladium?
--
Larry Blair   ames!vsi1!lmb   lmb@vicom.com
cudkeys:
cuddy4 cudenlmb cudfnLarry cudlnBlair cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Brian Yamauchi /  Re: excluding political discussions
     
Originally-From: yamauchi@cs.rochester.edu (Brian Yamauchi)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: excluding political discussions
Date: 4 Apr 89 18:35:20 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

In article <16283@oberon.USC.EDU> chandy@brand.usc.edu (Sundaresan
Chandrashekhar) writes:
>In article <8137@polya.Stanford.EDU> gangolli@wolvesden.Stanford.EDU
(Anil R. Gangolli) writes:
>)In article <3688@mit-amt> jrd@media-lab.media.mit.edu (Jim Davis) writes:
>)  )I beg you all, please keep this discussion to
>)  )the physics of fusion,
>)
>)I second his motion.  Please, let's get off things like fusion and
>)OPEC, fusion and terrorism, fusion and anti-nuke groups, etc.  Please
>)keep the discussion centered on fusion physics and technology. --anil.
>
>	I oppose the motion. Science, politics and human welfare are closely
>related.
>
>chandra.
 
If people are *strongly* opposed to discussion on the social,
economic, political, and long-range (read: highly speculative)
technological affects of cold fusion, perhaps this group could be
split into:
 
alt.fusion.news	:	Reserved for new information only.
			(experimental verification, publications)
 
alt.fusion.sci :	Reserved for scientific and technical
			discussions of cold fusion.
 
alt.fusion.spec :	Reserved for speculations on the applications
			for cold fusion as well as the possible
			social, economic, political effects.
 
 
In addition, this would provide a way for people to keep up with new
developments (in alt.fusion.news) without reading the other groups.
Even though I am interested in all three subjects, my tendency would
be to read all of the articles in the first group and skim the other
two.
 
_______________________________________________________________________________
 
Brian Yamauchi				University of Rochester
yamauchi@cs.rochester.edu		Computer Science Department
_______________________________________________________________________________
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Thant Tessman /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: thant@horus.SGI.COM (Thant Tessman)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 18:23:26 GMT
Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc., Mountain View, CA

In article <CLAMEN.89Apr3222622@CLAMEN.AVALON.CS.CMU.EDU>, clamen@CLAMEN
AVALON.CS.CMU.EDU (Stewart Clamen) writes:
> In article <28300@apple.Apple.COM> jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer) writes:
>
>    In article <CLAMEN.89Apr2224810@CLAMEN.CS.CMU.EDU>
>    clamen@CS.CMU.EDU (Stewart Clamen) writes:
>
[stuff deleted]
>    >
>    >i. (One that I've though about a bit)  It will free people from their
>    >   reliance on a central power supplier, thereby increasing
>    >   self-sufficiency, and encouraging people (and terrorist groups) to
>    >   become more anti-social in their behaviour.
>    >
>
>    I can readily agree about self-sufficiency, but you fail to support
>    any causality for the other half. Just how is this supposed to happen?
>    Can you cite instances in which people become more anti-social when
>    they become more self-reliant? (I can't.) C'mon, now, give us some
>    reason to believe the nasty claim! :-)
>
>    >
>    >   Relatedly, it decreases interdependance among nations, and thereby
>    >   increases the likelihood of major, national conflicts.
>    >
>
>    Again, unsupported. Not only that, I don't buy it. Maybe it decreases
>    _forced_ interdependency, but not _voluntary_ interdependency, and
>    once again, you haven't bothered to make any case for your claimed
>    causality.
>
> When people want you to do something for them, they often find that
> they are more successful when they are nice and friendly towards you.
> I believe that this works similarly the diplomatic world.  If you want
> something from a country, like oil, you have to be moderately friendly
> to it, like send over an ambassador, sell them weapons, and accept
> the ruling group's kids into Harvard.  If you suddenly find that your
> trading partner has nothing to trade, you would be more apt to make
> fun of his strange habits, since you would have less to lose if he got
> angry with you.
 
You didn't notice the _voluntary_ versus _involuntary_ part.  International
politics is the art of getting other governments to screw their people so our
government doesn't have to.
 
One of the U.S.'s main diplomatic tools is the CIA which functions by
fixing elections, assasinations, etc., not by being nice.  This is what makes
people from other countries mad at the U.S.
 
Another tool is the World Bank.  It's policies help keep in power unpopular
(puppet) and inefficient governments and industries.
 
Involuntary interdependencies, especially lopsided ones, CAUSE wars and
terrorist activities.  War is just a very large form of theft.
 
>
> Are Americans really so pro-"Free Trade"
> that they are willing to allow cheaper wood into their country,
> costing American jobs?
 
 Trade restrictions are designed to support local industries at the (greater
but more distributed) cost to consumers. A voluntary interdependency is more
likely to incite action when it is interfered with (such as trade
restrictions).
 
> Few countries decide their foreign policy based on ideology.
 
Especially the U.S.  The countries the U.S. gives aid to pay very little, if
any attention to human rights, free trade, or democracy.
 
>  When two
> countries join forces or begin to trade good and services, they do so
> because they each see advantages to be gained on their side, either a
> common enemy more likely to be defeated if attacked from the east and
> west, or larger markets for THEIR OWN goods and services.  If energy
> is free, Western (and Eastern) industrialized nations will not need to
> trade as much with the often less-than-democratic OPEC nations of the
> world, and won't.
 
And this may then finally allow those less-than-democratic governments to
fall from their own weight, hopefully to be replaced with something a little
more constructive (like free markets).
 
I'm sorry to talk so much about politics but people seem so ready to confuse a
people and their government.  Corporations don't tax, draft teenagers, mine
harbors, or conduct assasinations (unless they're paid to).
 
Also, it is a very old argument that technology destroys jobs.  There are
always more jobs created by the resources freed up by the technology than
lost to it.  It just requires people to change.  (There's that word again.)
 
Technology is the ONLY thing that improves the average standard of living.
(It does this by increasing labor productivity.)  Free markets foster the
distribution of the benefits of technology which in turn fosters
improvements in technology.
 
Anybody who tells you different probably wants to force you to buy something
from them instead of the Japanese (appropriately marked up, of course).
 
thant@sgi.com "Here's to cold fusion!"
cudkeys:
cuddy4 cudenthant cudfnThant cudlnTessman cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszL cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Gary Dare /  Re: short-term economic impact of cold fusion?
     
Originally-From: gld@CUNIXD.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU (Gary L Dare)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: short-term economic impact of cold fusion?
Date: 4 Apr 89 20:51:03 GMT
Organization: Columbia University, Dept. EE & CTR

In article <1617@vicom.COM> Larry Blair  wrote:
>
>Besides, if cold fusion really looks like it will come along, all
>"expensive" exploration will stop and OPEC will have only game in town.
 
This would be a disaster for the projects in the North Sea, Alaska and
the Canadian Arctic.  Most Canadian exploration and pilot research is
suspended because of low world prices, but my sources in Calgary tell
me that a lot of plans have been drawn up and set to go once US$24 is
hit (the papers always say US$20 is the magic number, but we're there
and Alberta is still quiet).  North Sea oil only broke even in the
last few years for the Brits, so this is the last thing they need, too.
 
C'est la vie!  (That's life!)
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ je me souviens ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 Gary L. Dare				> gld@eevlsi.ee.columbia.EDU
					> gld@cunixd.cc.columbia.EDU 	
	"SLAINTE MHATH!"		> gld@cunixc.BITNET
cudkeys:
cuddy4 cudengld cudfnGary cudlnDare cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Ralph Hyre /  Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
     
Originally-From: ralphw@ius3.ius.cs.cmu.edu (Ralph Hyre)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
Date: 4 Apr 89 21:09:51 GMT
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI

In article <1694@thor.acc.stolaf.edu> larsonjs@thor.stolaf.edu
(James S. Larson @ St. Olaf College) writes:
[If cold fusion works:]
>What could the oil companies do?  For instance they could buy the patents to
>the new devices and then keep them hidden, like they did to methane and
>hydrogen powered cars.
You can only hide something in this way for the life of the patent, right?
(17 years in the U.S.)
 
 
--
					- Ralph W. Hyre, Jr.
Internet: ralphw@{ius{3,2,1}.,}cs.cmu.edu    Phone:(412) CMU-BUGS
Amateur Packet Radio: N3FGW@W2XO, or c/o W3VC, CMU Radio Club, Pittsburgh, PA
"You can do what you want with my computer, but leave me alone!8-)"
--
cudkeys:
cuddy4 cudenralphw cudfnRalph cudlnHyre cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Paul Campbell /  Re: random thoughts on cold fusion
     
Originally-From: paul@taniwha.UUCP (Paul Campbell)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: random thoughts on cold fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 22:40:25 GMT
Organization: Taniwha Systems Design, Oakland

In article <15261@oddjob.UChicago.EDU> dmc@oddjob.uchicago.edu (Dave Cole) writes:
>a turbine trick, just as is done in a fission reactor.  In a fission reactor,
>the neutron flux which escapes the core is pretty much soaked up in the
>production of deuterium in the coolant water.  This is a problem for
 
Um ... doesn't 'water' contain things other than hydrogen? things rather
more massive? ....
 
	Paul
 
 
--
 
Paul Campbell, Taniwha Systems Design, Oakland CA ..!mtxinu!taniwha!paul
cudkeys:
cuddy4 cudenpaul cudfnPaul cudlnCampbell cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.05 / T Kunselman /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: tek@ms.uky.edu (Thomas Kunselman)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 5 Apr 89 02:29:20 GMT
Organization: U of Kentucky, Mathematical Sciences

In article <CLAMEN.89Apr2224810@CLAMEN.CS.CMU.EDU> clamen@CLAMEN.CS.CMU.
DU (Stewart Clamen) writes:
>     Solid state fusion is immoral because...
 
>i. (One that I've though about a bit)  It will free people from their
>   reliance on a central power supplier, thereby increasing
>   self-sufficiency, and encouraging people (and terrorist groups) to
>   become more anti-social in their behaviour.
>Stewart M. Clamen
>INTERNET: clamen@CS.CMU.EDU
>USENET:   ...!uunet!"clamen@cs.cmu.edu"
 
 
How will helping people become more self-sufficient encourage
them to engage in anti-social behaviour?
I would be more inclined to think that if people were more
self-sufficient then they would be less anti-social since they
wouldn't have to steal from me to survive.  Also they wouldn't
have to rely on governmental subsidies to survive.  If you
consider that sort of thing anti-social.
 
--
Thomas Kunselman                              {rutgers,uunet}!ukma!tek
Office of Institutional Research       bitnet: tek@ukma.bitnet
Kentucky State University            internet: tek@ms.uky.edu
Frankfort, KY 40601
cudkeys:
cuddy5 cudentek cudfnThomas cudlnKunselman cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Ethan Vishniac /  Re: Li6 plus D as a candidate fusion reaction
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Li6 plus D as a candidate fusion reaction
Date: 4 Apr 89 21:07:00 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <11750@ut-emx.UUCP>, ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
> Lithium is mostly
> Li7.  Li6 is not exactly rare, but it is less than 10 times as common
> as Li7.
 
My brother has gently pointed out to me that I meant that Li7 is more than
10 times as abundant as Li6.
 
Sorry about that.
 
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
cudkeys:
cuddy4 cudenethan cudfnEthan cudlnVishniac cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.05 / daniel offutt /  Patents on the Pons-Fleischmann fusion reactor
     
Originally-From: offutt@caen.engin.umich.edu (daniel m offutt)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Patents on the Pons-Fleischmann fusion reactor
Date: 5 Apr 89 02:58:00 GMT
Organization: caen

In article <4645@pt.cs.cmu.edu> ralphw@ius3.ius.cs.cmu.edu (Ralph Hyre) writes:
>In article <1694@thor.acc.stolaf.edu> larsonjs@thor.stolaf.edu
(James S. Larson @ St. Olaf College) writes:
>[If cold fusion works:]
>>What could the oil companies do?  For instance they could buy the patents to
>>the new devices and then keep them hidden, like they did to methane and
>>hydrogen powered cars.
>You can only hide something in this way for the life of the patent, right?
>(17 years in the U.S.)
 
I believe that Pons, Fleischmann, and U. Utah are not going to be able to
obtain patents in many countries outside of the US, due to the fact that
they revealed their method before applying for patents in those countries.
(Or perhaps they did apply for those patents and I am not aware of it.)
So the Pons-Fleischmann fusion reactor appears to be freely usable in
many places outside the US.  Under such circumstances, even if an oil
company purchased the rights to the PFFR, it is hard to believe they
would be able to suppress exploitation of the technology in the US.
 
Depending upon the cost effectiveness of the PFFR, there may not be
an oil company big enough to pay for all of the patent rights.  Why wouldn't
the U. Utah simply hold the patent rights and let companies bid for the
right to use the technology?
 
Also, cold fusion was not looked into by many researchers until very recently.
The simplicity and low-cost of the PFFR, along with the likelyhood that
hundreds or thousands of researchers will be studying this technology
from now on suggests that the technology may advance very quickly to something
quite different from its present form.  Different enough that independent
patents may be issued.
 
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Dan Offutt >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> offutt@cean.engin.umich.edu >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Mike Butts /  What would fusion power do to Japan?
     
Originally-From: mbutts@mntgfx.mentor.com (Mike Butts)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan,alt.fusion
Subject: What would fusion power do to Japan?
Date: 4 Apr 89 16:56:57 GMT
Organization: Mentor Graphics Corporation, Beaverton Oregon

As you may have heard in the popular press lately, a breakthrough may
have occurred in fusion power generation.  If the early claims by
Fleischmann and Pons of the University of Utah turn out to be true
(which is far from clear yet) it *may* turn out to be possible to build
fusion power plants which generate heat and/or electricity with fuel
which is easily extracted from seawater.  The process appears to be
intrinsically much safer than current fission power plants, and may
even work on a small scale (cars?).  It would generate no air pollution
or carbon dioxide, and only a small amount of radioactive waste, if any.
So far, it appears to depend on palladium, a precious metal which
is not consumed by the power plant, but which makes it fairly
capital-intensive.  Perhaps a substitute will be developed.
It is generally considered that practical developments might take
place on the scale of a decade or two, if the effect is true.
 
Here's a question I'd like to toss into discussion:  What would
cheap, safe, locally fueled energy do to Japan?  No one would be be
dependent on the outside world for their energy anymore.  We might
further postulate that abundant energy could make processes like
recycling much more practical, and thus reduce dependence on outside
materials.
 
I think a great increase in Japan's ability to be independent of
others would have a profound impact on Japan's view of the world
and of itself.  At first, I should think it would be an enormous boon.
However, much of the Japan's performance in trade and commerce, and
even cultural character, is fueled by its need to make the most of
outside material resources, as Japan has so little of its own.  If
this is no longer so much the case, Japan may not feel the need to be
so sharp to survive in the long run.  On the other hand, American
culture and attitudes have arguably been affected by our independence
of the need for outside resources, until recently.  What do you think?
--
Mike Butts, Research Engineer         KC7IT           503-626-1302
Mentor Graphics Corp., 8500 SW Creekside Place, Beaverton OR 97005
...!{sequent,tessi,apollo}!mntgfx!mbutts OR  mbutts@pdx.MENTOR.COM
These are my opinions, & not necessarily those of Mentor Graphics.
cudkeys:
cuddy4 cudenmbutts cudfnMike cudlnButts cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Jeff Erickson /  CALL FOR DISCUSSION: alt.fusion.politics
     
Originally-From: krazy@claris.com (Jeff Erickson)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: CALL FOR DISCUSSION: alt.fusion.politics
Date: 5 Apr 89 07:49:20 GMT
Organization: Claris Corporation, Mountain View CA

No, just kidding.
 
Are you physicists so unconcerned about the possible human consequences
of this discovery?  People are going to be affected by it in very
unscientific, political, economic ways.  Yes, let's hear discussions of
possible scientific repercussions, but let's not exclude the other topics
which may be more relevant to the "real" world.
 
Terrible misquote: "If I had known then what I know now, I would have become
a watchmaker." -- Albert Einstein.
 
[Please, someone, find the quote and correct me!]
 
--
Jeff Erickson     \  Internet: krazy@claris.com          AppleLink: Erickson4
Claris Corporation \      UUCP: {ames,apple,portal,sun,voder}!claris!krazy
415/960-2693        \________________________________________________________
____________________/        "I'm so heppy I'm mizzabil!" -- Krazy Kat
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Tom Wilson /  Re: excluding political discussions
     
Originally-From: wilson@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu (Tom Wilson)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: excluding political discussions
Date: 5 Apr 89 06:28:56 GMT
Organization: East-West Center, Honolulu

In article <1989Apr4.143521.17150@cs.rochester.edu> yamauchi@cs.rocheste
.edu (Brian Yamauchi) writes:
[quotes others who (a) don't want OPEC/fission/nuke/terrorism discussions,
 and those who argue that discussions of science should include the social
 ramifications]
 
>If people are *strongly* opposed to discussion on the social,
>economic, political, and long-range (read: highly speculative)
>technological affects of cold fusion, perhaps this group could be
>split into:
>
>alt.fusion.news	:	Reserved for new information only.
>			(experimental verification, publications)
>
>alt.fusion.sci :	Reserved for scientific and technical
>			discussions of cold fusion.
>
>alt.fusion.spec :	Reserved for speculations on the applications
>			for cold fusion as well as the possible
>			social, economic, political effects.
 
Let's not get carried away just yet.  Note that purely scientific/technical
discussions are still appropriate to sci.physics (but keep out the news
flashes and speculation).
 
It seems to me that the volume on this subject is already slowing down some;
I've been making a file of interesting/new articles, and the articles per
day is way down.  After all, this group is only about 1 week old, and the
original announcement about two weeks.
 
So IMHO, there is no need quite yet to go subgroup-crazy.
 
 
--
Tom Wilson                        wilson@uhccux.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu (Internet)
                                  wilson@uhccux.UUCP || wilson@uhccux (Bitnet)
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Ric Werme /  Re: So how do we get rid of by products?
     
Originally-From: werme@Alliant.COM (Ric Werme)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: So how do we get rid of by products?
Date: 4 Apr 89 00:00:39 GMT
Organization: Alliant Computer Systems, Littleton, MA

In article <338@taniwha.UUCP> paul@taniwha.UUCP (Paul Campbell) writes:
[On getting reation products out of Pd electrodes:]
>Maybe we do want to let the fusion get 'out of hand' so that the lump melts
>and the He4 gasses off, then we cool it by having it dribble into our heat
>exchanger etc etc
 
How about making electrodes out of sintered Pd powder?  The vastly improved
surface to volume ratio should allow much faster D adsorption and let the
reaction products out faster too.  Of course, if He is produced, well, it
does pretty well at slipping through most anything!
 
I recall a post about Pons talk warn about how dangerous trying to
replicate the experiment with Pd powder might be.  Until people figure out
just what is going on, I suspect efficiency and power density are not key
goals.
--
 
| A pride of lions              | Eric J Werme                |
| A gaggle of geese             | uucp: decvax!linus!alliant  |
| An odd lot of programmers     | Phone: 603-673-3993         |
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Lee Hollaar /  Re: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
     
Originally-From: hollaar%cs.utah.edu@wasatch.utah.edu (Lee Hollaar)
Newsgroups: misc.legal,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
Date: 5 Apr 89 07:45:26 GMT
Organization: University of Utah CS Dept

In article <42711f76.f3a4@lamo.engin.umich.edu> offutt@caen.engin.umich.
du (daniel m offutt) writes:
>I believe that Pons, Fleischmann, and U. Utah are not going to be able to
>obtain patents in many countries outside of the US, due to the fact that
>they revealed their method before applying for patents in those countries.
>(Or perhaps they did apply for those patents and I am not aware of it.)
>So the Pons-Fleischmann fusion reactor appears to be freely usable in
>many places outside the US.  Under such circumstances, even if an oil
>company purchased the rights to the PFFR, it is hard to believe they
>would be able to suppress exploitation of the technology in the US.
 
Without commenting on the specifics of a fusion patent, I'd like to state
that the University of Utah has an excellent technology transfer office,
headed by a patent attorney, and also employes outside patent counsel
when an invention appears to warrant filing for a patent.
 
>Depending upon the cost effectiveness of the PFFR, there may not be
>an oil company big enough to pay for all of the patent rights.  Why wouldn't
>the U. Utah simply hold the patent rights and let companies bid for the
>right to use the technology?
 
Gee, I wonder if the people in the technology transfer office thought of
that ;-).
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Jr Mccauley /  Are you trying fusion in a Test Tube?
     
Originally-From: jsm@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Jr. John S Mccauley)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.research,alt.fusion
Subject: Are you trying fusion in a Test Tube?
Date: 5 Apr 89 05:59:13 GMT
Organization: Princeton University, NJ

Dennis Manos (manos@ppl.mfenet) of the Princeton Plasma Physics Lab
would like to get in touch with people who are trying to do cold
fusion experiments, especially if you think you are getting positive results.
 
Please send him email at the address below if you have the names
and phone numbers/addresses of the Principle Investigators doing
cold fusion research.
 
Here are some more questions he has:
 
1. Pons and Fleischmann's Calorimetry
 
	Would appreciate further commerce with ANYONE, repeat ANYONE, who
	actually understands all of the ins-and-outs of P&F's calorimetry.
	What exactly did they measure and how - has anyone seen the data?
	Can anyone infer what the data may have looked like from the
	tabular summary they give? The 10**27 atm calculation also seems
	misguided.
 
	They completely neglected the accumulated strain energy of the
	Pd lattice, which could well have been at explosive levels indeed.
	Thoughts from cognescenti also welcomed on this subject.
 
2. The Jones 3*me quasiparticle
 
	Does anyone know what the 3*me quasiparticle proposed
	by Jones could look like?
	How does it get into the valence shell? Thoughts? Worries?
 
	Thanks,
 
		Scott
 
Addresses for Dennis Manos:
manos@ppc.mfenet			(MFENET)
manos%ppc.mfenet@nmfecc.llnl.gov 	(ARPA-INTERNET)
ucbvax!manos%ppc.mfenet@nmfecc.llnl.gov (UUCP)
manos%ppc.mfenet@ANLVMS.BITNET		(BITNET)
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Mike Pelt /  Submission for Alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: mvp@v7fs1.UUCP (Mike Van Pelt)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Submission for Alt.fusion
Date: 5 Apr 89 05:16:51 GMT
Organization: Alt.fusion/Mail Gateway

There's been a bit in the newspapers, but radio and TV have had pretty
close to absolutely zero on the subject.  Is it because the average
TV news reader (a.k.a. "journalist") has just about the comprehension
of science and technology of a cockroach?  Is it because they believe
that their audience is composed entirely of imbeciles?  Is it because
unless it's dead bodies, little fuzzy animals, or sports that it isn't
_news_?  (As you might guess, I'm more than a bit ticked off by this.)
 
Well, I'm sure glad I'm on the net.  Beats the Wall Street Journal by
a day or two, with more detail and not filtered through a reporter
with a shakey grasp on the subject.
--
Mike Van Pelt      mvp@video7.uucp
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / J Chandross /  Re: Cold fusion as a terrorist weapon?
     
Originally-From: jac@paul.rutgers.edu (J. A. Chandross)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a terrorist weapon?
Date: 4 Apr 89 01:53:29 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.

mattb@microsoft.UUCP (Matt Bamberger)
> Put LSD in the water supply.
 
LSD breaks down in sunlight.  Sorry to ruin your and Timothy Leary's day.
 
 
Jonathan A. Chandross
Internet: jac@paul.rutgers.edu
UUCP: rutgers!paul.rutgers.edu!jac
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Cullen Schaffer /  Why is fusion good?
     
Originally-From: schaffer@steeleye.rutgers.edu (Cullen Schaffer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Why is fusion good?
Date: 4 Apr 89 15:55:18 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.

 
I've always thought that the reason fusion is such a big deal is that
it gets us away from dealing with nasty radioactive fuels and waste:
hydrogen in, helium out.  But now I think I understand that the
high-energy neutron emissions from a fusion reaction create
radioactive materials.  Is that true?  Is dealing with fusion waste
somehow easier than dealing with fission waste?  Or are we mainly
excited about fusion (beyond the obvious scientific interest) because
it will make power cheaper?
 
In general, I'd like an informed technical opinion about the benefits
of fusion.  What do we gain if the recent claims check out?
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Randell Jesup /  Re: So how do we get rid of by products?
     
Originally-From: jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: So how do we get rid of by products?
Date: 5 Apr 89 02:09:33 GMT
Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA

In article <338@taniwha.UUCP> paul@taniwha.UUCP (Paul Campbell) writes:
>So suppose we are building a fusion engine of some sort - we have to:
>
>	1) squirt D into palladium etc
>	2) wait 'till it's "full" so that fusion starts
>	3) collect the power .... :-)
>
>so now what happens? at some point the fusion by-products start to build up
>inside the palladium, can they get out? Maybe they diffuse out at a slower
>rate than that at which D diffuses in (after all they have larger masses etc)?
>
>So eventually we have a lump of palladium so full of He4 (or whatever) that
>it's not much use.
 
	No, when it's fuel is used up (assuming it uses it up faster than
it diffuses in), you rotate a fresh one in and start recharging the old
one (or melt it down and recrystallize it to lett all the various gases
out).  Hopefully you can get enough out controllably that you can "throttle"
it, and have a large enough (long enough) bar full of deuterium when you
start for the journey (or enough small ones).  The power/weight ratio of
fusion, assuming you can even fuse a few percent of the deuterium, should be
excellent (at least for interplanetary travel).
 
	Does anyone know whether you can stop the fusion once it starts?
The UofU guys said they had their meltdown when they thought they were
shutting down the experiment.
 
--
Randell Jesup, Commodore Engineering {uunet|rutgers|allegra}!cbmvax!jesup
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Randell Jesup /  Re: random thoughts on cold fusion
     
Originally-From: jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: random thoughts on cold fusion
Date: 5 Apr 89 02:44:16 GMT
Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA

In article <366@YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu> BOLBENM@YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu writes:
>     1)  How much tritium might a cold fusion reactor produce?  I seem
>         to recall that tritium is really nasty stuff (the people at the
>         Princeton Tokamak have worried a lot about containing the
>         tritium they use), and it seems that a reaction which generates
>         tritium and also has the potential to burn a 4" hole in concrete
>         might be kind of nasty ...
 
	Well, people were talking that a lunar mining base should be built
eventually merely to mine tritium captured in lunar soil from the solar
wind.  Tritium is much better for hot fusion than deuterium, I believe.
Amusing: cold fusion may make hot fusion more practical by providing fuel.
 
>     2)  (This one is very unrealistic, assumes that cold fusion becomes
>         commercially practical very soon)
>           Anyone know if there are steel-producing processes that don't
>         use petrochemical coke? I.e., could you use fusion energy to do
>         it, or would you have to keep smelly steel plants?
 
	Well, hot fusion == a really good element seperator - put some big
mass spectrography equipment on the output of a fusion flame which you added
other material to.  Of course, there ARE some engineering problems...
(understatement of the week!)
 
--
Randell Jesup, Commodore Engineering {uunet|rutgers|allegra}!cbmvax!jesup
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Randell Jesup /  Re: Submission for Alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Submission for Alt.fusion
Date: 5 Apr 89 03:49:31 GMT
Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA

In article <8904030932.AA10433@apple.com> fusion@zorch.UU.NET writes:
>1) The Brigham Young University group finds some evidence for fusion
>reactions. They do NOT see ANYTHING LIKE "breakeven", reporting
>instead 10^-13 watts from their apparatus.
 
	Then again, UofU saw differing results for different diameters
of palladium rod (wire).
 
	Also, BYU was ONLY measuring neutrons, and not heat energy.  UoU
showed neutrons, but also showed a low number of neutrons.
 
	BYU had a different setup, and used palladium and titanium electrodes,
I believe.
 
--
Randell Jesup, Commodore Engineering {uunet|rutgers|allegra}!cbmvax!jesup
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 /  James_J_Kowalc /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: James_J_Kowalczyk@cup.portal.com
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 5 Apr 89 03:01:01 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz) writes:
>My impression was that alt.fusion was created as a ghetto for fluffy
>nonsense about fusion, and that sci.physics is the place to post more
>substantial stuff.  Or do we want a alt.fusion.nonsense?
>
>        Paul F. Dietz
>        dietz@cs.rochester.edu
 
Perhaps this group should be re-named "alt.confusion" to avoid
ambiguity.
 
Jim Kowalczyk
Kowalczyk@chemistry.utah.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 /  James_J_Kowalc /  Re: random thoughts on cold fusion
     
Originally-From: James_J_Kowalczyk@cup.portal.com
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: random thoughts on cold fusion
Date: 5 Apr 89 03:22:34 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

dmc@oddjob.UChicago.EDU (Dave Cole) writes:
 
>a turbine trick, just as is done in a fission reactor.  In a fission reactor,
>the neutron flux which escapes the core is pretty much soaked up in the
>production of deuterium in the coolant water.  This is a problem for
>fission, since the deuterium is radioactive and useless.  But in a fusion
                                ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Deuterium is neither radioactive nor useless.
 
Jim Kowalczyk
Kowalczyk@chemistry.utah.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Paul Dietz /  Re: section of preprint from Fleischmann and Pons
     
Originally-From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: section of preprint from Fleischmann and Pons
Date: 5 Apr 89 15:37:37 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

In article <11727@ut-emx.UUCP> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
 
>The spectrum of gamma rays emitted from the water bath due to the (n,gamma)
>reaction 1H+n(2.45MeV) into 2D +gamma(2.5MeV) (vii) was determined using a
>sodium iodide crystal scintillation detector and a Nuclear Data ND-6 High
>Energy Spectrum Analyzer.  The spectrum was taken above the water immediately
>surrounding an 0.8x10cm Pd-rod cathode charged to equilibrium; it was corrected
>for background by subtracting the spectrum over a sink (containing identical
>shielding materials) 10 m from the water bath.
...
> The [neutron] background count was determined by making measurements 50m
>from the laboratory containing the experiments: both locations were in the
>basement of a new building which is overlain by 5 floors of concrete.  In
>view of the low counting efficiency, counting was carried out for 50 hours.
>Measurements on a 0.4x10 cm rod electrode run at 64mA cm^-2 gave a neutron
>count 3 times above that of the background.
 
Does anyone but me have problems with this?  First, n+p ->d+gamma releases
2.2 MeV of binding energy; I don't see where the 2.5 MeV comes from.
 
Second, how could moving the detectors 10 and 50 meters from the
apparatus constitute a background measurement?  Couldn't there be
a spurious gamma & neutron source near their apparatus?  For example,
suppose someone played a prank on Pons and stuck a neutron source
under the table?
 
	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 /  Doug /  Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
     
Originally-From: roberts@studguppy.lanl.gov (Doug &)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
Date: 5 Apr 89 15:01:04 GMT
Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory

In article <1989Apr4.095659.672@mntgfx.mentor.com> mbutts@mntgfx.mentor.
om (Mike Butts) writes:
 
 
   Here's a question I'd like to toss into discussion:  What would
   cheap, safe, locally fueled energy do to Japan?  No one would be be
   dependent on the outside world for their energy anymore.  We might
   further postulate that abundant energy could make processes like
   recycling much more practical, and thus reduce dependence on outside
   materials.
 
Interesting question. I am continuously amazed that Japan can import
the raw materials for steel, and also the fuel to process the
materials, _and_ ship the steel across the Pacific to sell the product
for a profit in the US *while undercutting the US steel prices*! The
Japanese spent years investing capital in their steel industry, and as
a result the have the state of the art in efficient steel processing
capability. The managers of the US steel industry, on the other hand,
have spent the last 30 or so years skimming profits instead of
returning an appropriate number of $'s for capital investments. (The
last time I was in Pittsburg I saw a steel plant that had a rejection
rate for its only product, schedule 40 pipe, of **80** percent!! The
plant has since closed.)
 
A cheap energy source will only make the Japanese more effective as a
marketing power.
--
 
===============================================================
Douglas Roberts
Los Alamos National Laboratory
Box 1663, MS F-602
Los Alamos, New Mexico 87545
(505)667-4569
dzzr@lanl.gov
===============================================================
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / daniel offutt /  Re: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
     
Originally-From: offutt@caen.engin.umich.edu (daniel m offutt)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
Date: 5 Apr 89 15:53:00 GMT
Organization: U of M Engineering, Ann Arbor, Mich.

In article <1530@wasatch.utah.edu> hollaar%cs.utah.edu@wasatch.utah.edu
(Lee Hollaar) writes:
>Without commenting on the specifics of a fusion patent, I'd like to state
>that the University of Utah has an excellent technology transfer office,
>headed by a patent attorney, and also employes outside patent counsel
>when an invention appears to warrant filing for a patent.
 
The Netherlands, for example, does not give out patents on devices
described in public before a patent application is filed.  You cannot
publish first and then patent; you must patent before you publish.
Insofar as this is true in many countries, either UU has foregone
patent rights in those countries (in which case the technology is
freely usable by anyone there) or it applied some time ago for patents in
these countries.  In the latter case, it is likely that there would
have been some leaks from various non-US patent offices.
 
>>Depending upon the cost effectiveness of the PFFR, there may not be
>>an oil company big enough to pay for all of the patent rights.  Why wouldn't
>>the U. Utah simply hold the patent rights and let companies bid for the
>>right to use the technology?
>
>Gee, I wonder if the people in the technology transfer office thought of
>that ;-).
 
The question was for the benefit of those who suggested that an oil
company, utility, etc. might buy the patent rights and sit on the
technology.
 
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Dan Offutt >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> offutt@caen.engin.umich.edu >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 /  andrew /  New fusion results reported
     
Originally-From: andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: New fusion results reported
Date: 5 Apr 89 15:51:03 GMT
Organization: National Semiconductor, Santa Clara

The Wall Street Journal reports today that Brookhaven have "duplicated" the
P&F results. I don't have more details.
=====
Andrew Palfreyman 		USENET: ...{this biomass}!nsc!logic!andrew
National Semiconductor M/S D3969, 2900 Semiconductor Dr., PO Box 58090,
Santa Clara, CA 95052-8090 ; 408-721-4788 		there's many a slip
							'twixt cup and lip
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / John Nagle /  Re: Patents on the Pons-Fleischmann fusion reactor
     
Originally-From: jbn@glacier.STANFORD.EDU (John B. Nagle)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Patents on the Pons-Fleischmann fusion reactor
Date: 5 Apr 89 16:50:47 GMT
Organization: Stanford University

 
      Basic patent info on foreign filings:
 
      - Publication anywhere before any filing inhibits patenting in most
	countries outside the U.S.
 
      - One can still file in the U.S. up to one year after public disclosure.
 
      - Having filed in one country, one has up to one year to file in
	any other country which is a signatory to the International Convention
	for the Protection of Industrial Property (the "Paris Convention").
	This holds even if disclosure takes place after the first filing.
	The non-Paris Convention countries are mostly non-industrial,
	although the list includes Hong Kong, India, Kuwait, the Philippines,
	the Republic of China, Singapore, and Venezuela.  All the European
	countries (East and West), the USSR, Japan, Canada, and Mexico
	subscribe to the Paris Convention.
 
      - Patent protection also protects against imports, not just domestic
	manufacture.
 
					John Nagle
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / J Chandross /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: jac@paul.rutgers.edu (J. A. Chandross)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 03:35:49 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.

bright@Data-IO.COM (Walter Bright)
>You forgot the usual Luddite objections:
>	1. It would cost thousands of jobs in the oil, gas & coal industries.
>	2. There are unanswered questions about it.
>	3. It represents *change*!
 
Actually, you are not being fare to Ludd.  The automatic loom threatened
the jobs of Ludd and the other weavers.  Ludd didn't care about change,
or the unanswered questions, he just cared about his job.  Nothing wrong
with that; special interest and human greed is what makes the world work.
You wouldn't be a commie would you?
 
 
Jonathan A. Chandross
Internet: jac@paul.rutgers.edu
UUCP: rutgers!paul.rutgers.edu!jac
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Peter Desnoyers /  Re: Why is fusion good?
     
Originally-From: desnoyer@Apple.COM (Peter Desnoyers)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Why is fusion good?
Date: 5 Apr 89 18:13:57 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA

In article <Apr.4.11.55.14.1989.3450@steeleye.rutgers.edu> schaffer@stee
eye.rutgers.edu (Cullen Schaffer) writes:
>
>I've always thought that the reason fusion is such a big deal is that
>it gets us away from dealing with nasty radioactive fuels and waste:
>hydrogen in, helium out.  But now I think I understand that the
>high-energy neutron emissions from a fusion reaction create
>radioactive materials.  Is that true?
 
Yes. Layperson-level articles I have seen (Sci. Am.? IEEE Spectrum?)
about Tokomaks have mentioned that such a reactor would have a working
life of about 30 years (neutrons make stainless steel brittle) and
would be quite radioactive by the time it was decommissioned. Unless
you shield with something that does not become radioactive, you have
radioactive waste when you decommission a fusion reactor, whether
plasma or room temp. Somehow, I don't think we are ever going to see
these things in cars - they might make liquid sodium / liquid sulfer
batteries look safe.
 
				Peter Desnoyers
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / William Johnson /  Re: section of preprint from Fleischmann and Pons
     
Originally-From: mwj@beta.lanl.gov (William Johnson)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: section of preprint from Fleischmann and Pons
Date: 5 Apr 89 17:27:19 GMT
Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory

Paul Dietz writes:
[ref. Ethan Vishniac's posting of a section from the F&P paper alluding to
"H+n->D+2.5 MeV"]
 
> Does anyone but me have problems with this?  First, n+p ->d+gamma releases
> 2.2 MeV of binding energy; I don't see where the 2.5 MeV comes from.
 
The 2.5 was a typo, apparently; the figure with the F&P paper clearly points
out a peak at 2.2 MeV, more or less.
 
> Second, how could moving the detectors 10 and 50 meters from the
> apparatus constitute a background measurement?  Couldn't there be
> a spurious gamma & neutron source near their apparatus?  For example,
> suppose someone played a prank on Pons and stuck a neutron source
> under the table?
 
You don't mind asking the hard ones, do you?
 
As an example of such a source -- and please understand that I am NOT saying
this is the cause of the peak in F&P's spectrum -- there is a well-known gamma
ray of energy 2.204 MeV that is emitted in the decay of bismuth 214, a
naturally-occurring member of the uranium-238 decay chain.  With the resolution
achievable with a sodium iodide detector, this gamma ray cannot be resolved
from the 2.223-MeV gamma ray resulting from neutron capture in hydrogen.
 
It is therefore at least *theoretically* possible that F&P could have been led
astray by some large concentration of uranium (in equilibrium with its
daughters) near their operating experimental setup.  Personally, I doubt this;
F&P have too good a reputation to fall into something this transparent.
 
As for a "prank": neutrons sources are much harder to come by than gamma
sources are, and they tend to be carefully monitored by health physicists at
the instutitions that have them.  (I have a rather chilling story from graduate
school as a counterexample to this, I must say ...)  That explanation too
seems a bit far-fetched -- but so are all the alternatives, so maybe you're
onto something. :-)
 
--
"One thing they don't tell you about doing	| Bill Johnson
experimental physics is that sometimes you	| Los Alamos Nat'l Laboratory
must work under adverse conditions ... like	| {!cmcl2!lanl!mwj}
a state of sheer terror." (W. K. Hartmann)	| (mwj@lanl.gov)
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 /  newton2@violet /  Re: New fusion results reported
     
Originally-From: newton2@violet.berkeley.edu
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: New fusion results reported
Date: 5 Apr 89 18:29:49 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley

This is false; the WSJ reported that Brookhaven has tentatively
confirmed the Brigham Young (Jones) results, not the Pons results;
in effect the BYU experiment disconfirms the Pons claim of energy
breakeven and is at least consistent (i.e. reasonable agreement
between neutrons and heat) with known physics.
 
Yesterdays New York Times reported the first for-attribution
skeptical remark whose temperature and energy spectrum were
consistent with the behavior of the UUtah pair: a (real) fusion
physicist from LLNL said "pure self-deception...preposterous".
 
doug maisel
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------------------------------
1989.04.04 / J Hall /  Re: The deal
     
Originally-From: josh@klaatu.rutgers.edu (J Storrs Hall)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: The deal
Date: 4 Apr 89 21:32:27 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.

RCH@cup.portal.com writes:
>Aside from a quick blurb on CNN, I have not heard *anything* wrt cold
>fusion in any other media, news channel or "real world" discussion.
 
I have personally seen stories in Science, Science News, the NY Times,
and Business Week, and a preprint of one of the papers.
 
...of course, you're seeing *this* message over the net, so you still
don't know what to think...  :^)
 
--JoSH
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Travis Winfrey /  Re: The deal
     
Originally-From: travis@douglass.columbia.edu (Travis Lee Winfrey)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: The deal
Date: 5 Apr 89 00:12:13 GMT
Organization: Columbia University

In article <16664@cup.portal.com> RCH@cup.portal.com (Ric C Helton) writes:
>Aside from a quick blurb on CNN, I have not heard *anything* wrt cold
>fusion in any other media, news channel or "real world" discussion.
>Is this thing being covered at all by the general media? ...
>Even so, you'd think the papers
>would have *something* about it.
 
It was prominently featured in the NY Times, as well as in the
Economist, a well-respected British news magazine.  There was an NPR
correspondent on the net posting info not too long ago, so he'll
probably get a report out.  All of these news sources are especially
well-read in the Washington community.
 
I think public discussion of room-temperature superconductivity took
at least as long -- and met an equally perplexed lay audience.  You
have to keep in mind how technically minded the audience is on usenet.
 
t
 
Arpa:	travis@mojo.cs.columbia.edu	Usenet: rutgers!columbia!travis
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Walter Bright /  Re: The deal
     
Originally-From: bright@Data-IO.COM (Walter Bright)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: The deal
Date: 5 Apr 89 22:16:13 GMT
Organization: Data I/O Corporation; Redmond, WA

In article <16664@cup.portal.com> RCH@cup.portal.com (Ric C Helton) writes:
<Aside from a quick blurb on CNN, I have not heard *anything* wrt cold
<fusion in any other media, news channel or "real world" discussion.
<Is this thing being covered at all by the general media?  CNN's announcer
<gave the impression by his attitude, that this was another "Yawn,
<perpetual motion hoax" type affair.....  Even so, you'd think the papers
<would have *something* about it.
 
The Wall Street Journal has had a number of well-informed articles about
it. I think that other papers don't cover it because they don't understand
the significance of it. It is very possibly the discovery of the century
(though only time will tell!). The usual media is only interested in stuff
like who is sleeping with who, Oprah's new diet plan, and the latest
movie star who's recovered from alcoholism.
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Ray Dueland /  Heavy Water
     
Originally-From: rayd@laidbak.UUCP (Ray Dueland)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Heavy Water
Date: 5 Apr 89 17:30:40 GMT
Organization: Lachman Associates, Inc. Naperville, Il.

In article <1989Apr4.095659.672@mntgfx.mentor.com>
mbutts@mntgfx.mentor.com (Mike Butts) writes:
>[... deuterium] which is easily extracted from seawater.
 
How is deuterium obtained from water?  I would imagine some type of
column chromatography, but I'm only guessing.  Does water have to be
broken down in to hydrogen (deuterium) and oxygen first?
 
--
Ray Dueland
{amdahl|clout|masscomp|nucsrl|sun|tellab5}!laidbak!rayd
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Dave Mack /  Re: So how do we get rid of by products?
     
Originally-From: mack@inco.UUCP (Dave Mack)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: So how do we get rid of by products?
Date: 5 Apr 89 23:46:03 GMT
Organization: McDonnell Douglas-INCO, McLean, VA

In article <6498@cbmvax.UUCP> jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup) writes:
>In article <338@taniwha.UUCP> paul@taniwha.UUCP (Paul Campbell) writes:
>>So suppose we are building a fusion engine of some sort - we have to:
>>
>>	1) squirt D into palladium etc
>>	2) wait 'till it's "full" so that fusion starts
>>	3) collect the power .... :-)
>>
>>so now what happens? at some point the fusion by-products start to build up
>>inside the palladium, can they get out? Maybe they diffuse out at a slower
>>rate than that at which D diffuses in (after all they have larger masses etc)?
>>
>>So eventually we have a lump of palladium so full of He4 (or whatever) that
>>it's not much use.
>
>	No, when it's fuel is used up (assuming it uses it up faster than
>it diffuses in), you rotate a fresh one in and start recharging the old
>one (or melt it down and recrystallize it to lett all the various gases
>out).  Hopefully you can get enough out controllably that you can "throttle"
>it, and have a large enough (long enough) bar full of deuterium when you
>start for the journey (or enough small ones).  The power/weight ratio of
>fusion, assuming you can even fuse a few percent of the deuterium, should be
>excellent (at least for interplanetary travel).
 
I don't pretend to understand this but how about a Pd pipe with high-pressure
deuterium on the inside, low-pressure deuterium on the outside, pipe thickness
tuned to allow continuous fusion as the deuterium diffuses through the pipe
carrying the waste products with it?
 
Naturally, coolant and electrode geometries will interfere with this, but
would this work in principle?
 
--
Dave Mack
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Mark Chadwick /  Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
     
Originally-From: ncc1701@pawl.rpi.edu (Mark O. Chadwick)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
Date: 6 Apr 89 00:09:21 GMT
Organization: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY

In article <1586@attdso.att.com> tim@attdso.att.com (Tim J Ihde) writes:
>Seeing as that at this time he must have been talking about fission power,
>I'm glad they never whent through with this plan.  Even those who accept
>fission reactors as relativly safe should have problems with a fission
>powered airplane.  A nuclear sub would just sink (bad enough), but can you
>imagine a fission reactor in a plane strewn over several miles when the
>thing crashes?  A plane crash is much more likely than a meltdown . . .
 
I seem to recall something about a bomber being flown in the late 40's or
early 50's that used NUCLEAR power.  It's a good thing that didn't crash,
or a mess would certainly have been generated!
 
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------
ncc1701@pawl.rpi.edu       | Live long and prosper, Spock
USERGDES@rpitsmts.bitnet   | I shall do neither.  I have killed my
 (Mark Chadwick)           |    captain...and my friend
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / John Marvin /  Request for scan of Cold Fusion Paper
     
Originally-From: jsm@hpfcdc.HP.COM (John Marvin)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Request for scan of Cold Fusion Paper
Date: 5 Apr 89 03:07:26 GMT
Organization: HP Ft. Collins, Co.

 
	Is there someone who has the Pons & Fleischmann preprint who would
be willing to scan it and make it available vi anonymous ftp? I enjoyed
reading the Jones, etc. preprint that was made available in the same manner.
 
	John Marvin
	jsm%hpfcls@hplabs.hp.com
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Sho Kuwamoto /  Jones and Palmer Paper
     
Originally-From: sho@pur-phy (Sho Kuwamoto)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Jones and Palmer Paper
Date: 5 Apr 89 16:41:38 GMT
Organization: Purdue Univ. Physics Dept., W. Lafayette, IN

I just got a text version of the Jones and Palmer paper from BYU.
As far as I know, the only place I've seen this on the net was
the digitized file who some kind soul set up at an FTP site.
Please excuse me if it's been posted before and I just missed it.
I have crossposted to sci.physics since not all machines get the
alt.groups.
 
----------
                            OBSERVATION OF
                COLD NUCLEAR FUSION IN CONDENSED MATTER
 
  S. E. Jones, E. P. Palmer, J. B. Czirr, D. L. Decker, G. L. Jensen,
                    J. M. Thorne, and S. F. Taylor
 
                  Department of Physics and Chemistry
                       Brigham Young University
                           Provo, Utah 84602
 
                                  and
 
                              J. Rafelski
                         Department of Physics
                         University of Arizona
                         Tucson, Arizona 85721
                            March 23, 1989
 
Fusion of istopic hydrogen nuclei is the principal means of producing
energy in the high-temperature interior of stars.  In relatively cold
terrestrial conditions, the nuclei are clothed with electrons and
approach one another no closer than allowed by the molecular Coulomb
barrier.  The rate of nuclear fusion in molecular hydrogen is then
governed by the quantum-mechanical tunneling through that barrier, or
equivalently, the probability of finding the two nuclei at zero
separation.  In a deuterium molecule, where the equilibrium separation
between deuterons (d) is 0.74 A, the d-d fusion rate is exceedingly
slow, about 10E-70 per D  molecule per second. [1]
                        2
 
By replacing the electron in a hydrogen molecular ion with a more
massive charged particle, the fusion rate is greatly increased.  In
muon-catalyzed fusion, the internuclear separation is reduced by a
factor of approximately 200 (the muon to electron mass ratio), and the
nuclear fusion rate correspondingly increases by roughly eighty orders
of magnitude [1].  Muon-catalyzed fusion has been demonstrated to be
an effective means of rapidly inducing fusion reactions in low-
temperature hydrogen isotopic mixtures [2].
 
A hypothetical quasi-particle a few times as massive as the electron
would increase the cold fusion rate to readily measureable levels,
about 10E-20 fusions per d-d molecule per second [1].  Our results
imply that an equivalent distortion on the internuclear hydrogen
wavefunction can be realized under certain conditions when hydrogen
isotopic nuclei are loaded into metallic crystalline lattices and
other forms of condensed matter.
 
We have discovered a means of inducing nuclear fusion without the use
of either high temperatures or radioactive muons.  We will present
direct experimental results as well as indirect geological evidence
for the occurrence of cold nuclear fusion.
 
DETECTION OF COLD FUSION NEUTRONS
 
We have observed deuteron-deuteron fusion at room temperature during
low-voltage electrolytic infusion of deuterons into metallic titanium
or palladium electrodes.  The fusion reaction
 
                         3
                d + d ->  He (0.82 MeV) + n (2.45 MeV)            (1a)
 
                           +
is evidently catalyzed as d  and metal ions from the electrolyte are
depostited at (and into) the negative electrode.  Neutrons having
approximately 2.5 MeV energy are clearly detected with a sensitive
neutron spectrometer.  The experimental layout is portrayed in Figure
1.  We have not yet obtained results regarding the parallel reaction
 
                 d + d -> p (3.02 MeV) + t (1.01 MeV)             (1b)
 
as this requires different measuring procedures.  However, it can be
presumed that the reaction (1b) occurs at a nearly equal rate as the
reaction (1a), which is usually the case.
 
The neutron spectrometer, developed at Brigham Young University over
the past few years [3], has been crucial to the identification of this
cold fusion process.  The detector consists of a liquid organic
scintillator (BC-505) contained in a glass cylinder 12.5 cm in
diameter, in which three lithium-6-doped glass scintillator plates are
embedded.  Neutrons deposit energy in the liquid scintillator via
collisions and the resulting light output yields energy information.
These, now low-energy neutrons are then scavenged by lithium-6 nuclei
                                           6           4
in the glass plates where the reaction n +  Li --> t +  He results in
scintillations in the glass.  Pulse shapes from the two media differ
so that distinct signals are registered by the two photomultiplier
tubes (whose signals are summed).  A coincidence of signals from the
two media with 20 microseconds identifies the neutrons.
 
An energy calibration of the spectrometer was obtained using 2.9 and
3.2 MeV neutrons, generated via deuteron-deuteron interactions at 90
degrees and 0 degrees, respectively, with respect to the deuteron beam
from a Van de Graaf accelerator.  The observed energy spectra show a
broad structure which implies that 2.45 MeV neutrons should appear in
the multi-channel analyzer spectrum in channels 45-150.  Stability of
the detector system was checked between data runs by measuring the
counting rate for fission neutrons from a broad-spectrum californium-
252 source.  We have performed other extensive tess proving that our
neutron counter does not respond in this pulse height range to other
sources of radiation such as thermal neutrons.
 
Background rates in the neutron counter are approximately 10E-3 1/s in
the energy region where 2.5 MeV neutrons are anticipated.  By
comparing energy spectra from gamma and neutron sources we have
determined that nearly all of the background stems from accidental
coincidences of gamma-ray events.  Improvements in the shielding and
gamma-ray rejection were pursued throughout the experiments, resulting
in significant reduction in background levels.
 
During the search for suitable catalytic materials, we developed the
following (unoptimized) prescription for the electrolytic cells. The
electrolyte is a mixture of 160 g deutermium oxide (D O) plus various
                                                      2
 
metal salts in 0.2 g amounts each:  FeSO  . 7H O, NiCl  . 6H O,
                                         4     2       2     2
 
PdCl , CaCO , Li SO  . H O, NaSO  . 10H O, CaH (PO )  . H O,
    2      3    2  4    2       4      2      4   4 2    2
 
TiOSO  . H SO  . 8H O, and a very small amount of AuCN.
     4    2  4     2
 
(Our evidence indicates the importance of co-deposition of deuterons
and metal ions at the negative electrode.)  The pH is adjusted to
pH < 3 with HNO .  Titanium and palladium, intially selected because
                3
of their large capacities for holding hydrogen and forming hydrides,
were found to be effective negative electrodes.
 
Other metals receiving preliminary tests include lanthanum, nickel,
iron, copper, zirconium, tantalum, and lithium-aluminum hydride.
Individual electrodes consisted of approximately 3 g purified "fused"
titanium in pellet form, or 0.5 g of 0.25 mm thick palladium foils, or
5 g of mossy palladium.  Typically 4-8 cells were used simultaneously.
The palladium pieces were sometimes re-used after cleaning and
roughening the surfaces with dilute acid or abrasives.  Hydrogen
bubbles were observed to form on the Pd foils only after several
minutes of electrolysis, suggesting the rapid absorption of deuterons
into the foil; oxygen bubbles formed at the anode immediately.  Gold
foil was used for the positive electrodes.  DC power supplies provided
3-25 volts across each cell at currents of 10-500 mA.  Correlations
between fusion yield and voltage, current density, or surface
characteristics of the metallic cathode have not yet been established.
 
Small jars, approximately 4 cm high x 4 cm diameter, held 20 ml of
electroylte solution each.  The electrolytic cells were placed on or
alongside the neutron counter, as shown in Figure 1.  The cells are
simple and doubtless far from optimum at present.  Nevertheless, the
present combination of our cells with the state-of-the-art neutron
spectrometer is sufficient to establish the phenomenon of cold nuclear
fusion during the electrolytic infusion of isotopic hydrogen into
metals.
 
Figure 2 displays the energy spectrum obtained under conditions
described above, juxtaposed with the background spectrum.  Assuming
conservatively that all deviations from background are statistical
fluctuations, we scale the background counts by a factor of 0.46 to
match the foreground counts over the entire energy range (Figure 2). A
feature in channels 45-150 still rises above background by nearly
four standard deviations.  This implies that our assumption is too
conservative and that this structure represents a real physical effect.
By re-scaling the background by a factor of 0.44 to match the
foreground level in regions outside this feature, the difference plot
(Figure 3) is obtained.  It shows a robust signal centered at channel
100 of over five standard-deviation statistical significance. A
Guassian fit to this peak yields a centroid at channel 101 and a
sigma of 28 channels.  This is precisely where 2.5 MeV fusion
neutrons should appear in the spectrum according to our calibration.
The fact that a significant signal appears above background with the
correct energy for d-d fusion neutrons ( 2.5 MeV) provides strong
evidence that room temperature nuclear fusion is indeed occurring in
our electrolytic catalysis cells.
 
FUSION RATE DETERMINATION
 
It is instructive to scrutinize the fourteen individual runs which
enter into the combined data discussed above.  Figure 4 displays, for
each run, the ratio of foreground count rate in the 2.5 MeV-energy
region with background rates obtained for each run.  Background rates
were improved upon during the experiments, so we plot the data in
terms of foreground-to-background ratios rather than absolute rates.
 
Run 6 is particular noteworthy, having a statistical significance of
approximately 5 standard deviations above background.  Fused titanium
pellets were used as negative electrodes with a total mass of about 3
g.  The neutron production rate increased after about one hour of
electrolysis.  After about eight hours, the rate dropped dramatically
as shown in the follow-on run 7.  At this time, surfaces of the Ti
electrodes showed a dark gray coating.  An analysis using electron
microscopy with a microprobe showed that the surface coating was
mostly iron, deposited with deuterons at the cathode.  The same
phenomenon of having the neutron signal drop after about eight hours
of operation appears in run 13 follwed by run 14.  Runs 13 and 14 used
the same eight electrochemical cells, and again the negative
electrodes developed coatings after a few hours of electrolysis.
These observations suggest the importance of surface conditions on the
cold fusion process.  Indeed, wide variations in surface
conditions are anticipated in the operating electrochemical cells with
numerous ionic species, and these variations may account for the
fluctuations in the signal level which are evident in Figure 4.  In
particular, the observed "turning off" of the signal after  8 hours
may account for a low signal-to-background ratio in runs 1 and 3, in
that a few-hour signal may have been overwhelmed after a long (20
hour) running time.
 
When run 10 started with rates substantially above background, we
stopped the run and removed half of the electrochemical cells as a
test.  The neutron production rate dropped off as expected (run 11).
In determining the statistical significance of the data, we included
runs 1, 3, 7, 11 and 13, even though we see a systematic reason for
their low foreground-to-background ratios as explained above.  Run 8,
shown in Figure 4, was inadvertently lost from the magnetic storage
device and could not be included in Figures 2 and 3.  This does not
change our conclusions.
 
Extensive efforts were made to generate fake neutron signals by using
various gamma and neutron sources.  We also turned auxiliary equipment
on and off; the Van de Graaf accelerators were kept off.  The signals
persisted as shielding was moved and as electronics modules were
tuned and even replaced.  Background runs taken using operating
electrochemical cells similar to those described above but with
H O replacing the D O were featureless.  No net counts above
 2                 2
background when standard cells were used with no current flowing.
 
The cold nuclear fusion rate during electrolytic fusion is estimated
specifically for run 6 (Figure 4) as follows:
 
                                      [  R  ]   / [      d  ]
          Fusions per deuteron pair = [ --- ]  /  [ M x --- ]      (2)
                                      [  e  ] /   [      2M ]
 
where the observed fusion rate R = (4.1 +- 0.8) x 10E-3 fusions/s; the
neutron detection efficiency, including geometrical acceptance, is
calculated using a monte carlo neutron-photon transport code [4] to
be e = (1.0 +- 0.3)%; M = 4x10E22 titanium atoms for 3 g of
titanium; and the deuteron-pair per metal ion ration d/(2M) = 1 is
based on the assumption that nearly all tetrahedral sites in the
titanium lattice are occupied, forming the gamma-TiD  hydride.  Then
                                                    2
the estimated cold nuclear fusion rate by equation (2) is
 
             lambda  10E-23 fusions/deuteron pair/second          (3)
                   f
 
If most fusions take place near the surface or if the titanium lattice
is far from saturated with deuterons, or if conditions favoring fusion
occur intermittently, then the inferred fusion rate must be much
larger, perhaps 10E-20 fusions/d-d/second.
 
We note that such a fusion rate could be achieved by "squeezing" the
deuterons to half their normal (0.74 A) separation in molecules.  That
such rates are now observed in condensed matter suggests
"piezonuclear" fusion as the explanation [1].  A possible cause is
that quasi-electrons form in the deuterated metal lattic having an
effective mass a few times that of a free electron.  Isotopic hydrogen
is known to accumulate at imperfections in metal lattices [5] and
local high concentrations of hydrogen ions might be conducive to
piezonuclear fusion.  Since we have not seen any evidence for fusion
in equilibrated, deuterated metals or compounds such and
methylamine-d  dueteriochloride or ammonium-d  chloride, we conclude
             2                               4
that non-equilibrium conditions are essential.  Electrolysis is one
way to produce conditions which are far from equilibrium.
 
It seems remarkable that one can influence the effective rate of
fusion by varying external parameters such as pressure, heat and
electromagnetic fields, but just such effects are confirmed in another
form of cold nuclear fusion; muon-catalyzed fusion [6].  Such
variations are naturally encountered in the geological environment
where heat, pressure, and contact potentials will generate serverly
non-equilibrium conditions.
 
GEOPHYSICAL CONSIDERATIONS
 
The observation of evidence for cold d-d fusion in the laboratory has
profound geophysical implications.  Thermal effects in the earth and
                    3
the distribution of  He and tritium can be explained in part by the
fusion reactions (1) and
 
                             3
                    p + d ->  He + gamma (5.4 MeV)                 (4)
 
Deuterium was incorporated in the earth during its formation.  The
current abundance in sea water is about 1.5x10E-4 deuterons per
proton.  Water is carried down into the earth's upper mantle at
converging plate margins, and seawater is transported as deep as the
Moho at spreading regions [7].  Estimates of water subduction suggest
that a water mass equal to the ocean mass is cycled through the mantle
in about 1-billion years [7].  Thus, 1.4x10E43 deuterons are cycled
through the mantle in 3x10E16 s.  Since each p-d fusion releases 5.4
MeV (8.6x10-13 J), we calculate that a heat flux of 750 mW/(m*m),
averaged over the earth, would result if all deuterium fused at the
rate at which it is supplied by subduction.  This is more than ten
times the estimate of the actual flux of 60 mW/(m*m) [8].  Thus,
geological p-d fusion could possibly contribute to the observed heat
flux, the high temperatures of the earth's core and provide an energy
source for plate tectonics.
 
The foregoing data allow a geological fusion rate lambda  to be
                                                        f
calculated.  We assume a first-order rate equation for p-d
fusion: dN = lambda N dt, or lambda  = (dN/N)dt.  The fraction (dN/N)
                   f               f
is the ratio of the number of fusions which take place to the number
of atoms available.  It is also the rate of fusion divided by the rate
of supply of deuterons; thus, dN/N is equal to the actual heat flux
from the earth divided by the possible heat flux so that
 
                                                       -1
                lambda  = (60/750)/3x10E16 s = 3x10E-18 s           (5)
                      f
 
Consider next the possibility that the localized heat of volcanism at
subduction zones is supplied by fusion.  As much as 10E6 J/kg is
required to turn rock into magma, and this must be supplied from a
local source of energy.  Subducting rock contains about 3 percent
water [7], or 3x10E30 deuterons/kg.  If the time available for melting
is equal to the time required for a plate to travel down a slant
distance of 700 km at a speed of 2.5 cm/year, about 10E15 s, the
inferred fusion rate is:
 
  lambda  = (10E6 J/kg)/(3x10E20 d/kg x 8.6E10-13 J/fusion x 10E15 s)
        f
  lambda  = 4x10E-18 fusions/d/s                                  (6)
        f
 
This requires only about 0.3 percent of the available nuclear fuel.
The limit on the available heat is therefore the fusion rate constant,
rather than the scarcity of fuel.
 
While some of the earth's heat must certainly derive from several
sources, "cold" geological nuclear fusion could account for steady-
                                          3
state production of considerable heat and  He in the earth's interior.
                   3   4
High values of the  He/ He ratio are found in the rocks, liquids, and
gases from volcanoes and other active tectonic regions [9].
           3
Primordial  He will be present from the formation of the earth [9],
but some may be generated by terrestrial nuclear fusion.  The
discovery of cold nuclear fusion in the laboratory, with a rate
constant comparable to that derived from geologic thermal data,
supports our hypothesis.
 
Based on this new concept, we predict that some tritium should be
produced by d-d fusion in the earth (see equation 1).  Since tritium
                         3
decays according to t ->  He + beta with a 12-year half-life,
detection of tritium in volcanic emissions would imply cold-fusion
production of tritium.  This is supported by the following
observations.  A tritium monitoring station was operated at Mauna Loa
on Hawaii Island from August 1971 to the end of 1977.  We have found
strong correlations between tritium detected at Mauna Loa and nearby
volcanic activity in this period of time.  Figure 4 displays data
compiled by Ostlund for HT gas measured at the Mauna Loa station in
1972 [10].  Similar data taken at Miami, Florida, are provided for
comparison.  A striking spike in the tritium level is clearly seen in
the February-March 1972 Mauna Loa data.  Ostlund notes that these
significant tritium readings over a several-week period have not been
previously understood; in particular, the timing and shape of the peak
is inconsistent with hydrogen bomb tests in Russia five months earlier
[10].  However, this signal is coincident with a major eruption of the
Mauna Ulu volcano [11] 40 km to the southeast.  Furthermore, winds in
March 1972 carried volcanic gases northwest, towards the Mauna Loa
station and on towards Honolulu 200 km away: "Trade winds [from the
northeast] were infrequent and the southerly flow that replaced them
occasionally blanketed the state with volcanic haze from an eruption
on Hawaii Island ... High particulate matter measurements in Honolulu
confirmed the northward spread of haze from the Mauna Ulu Volcano
eruption on Hawaii Island." [12]
 
This remarkable set of cirumstances permits us to estimate the amount
of tritium released during the February-March 1972 eruption of Mauna
Ulu.  Based on the distance to the Mauna Loa station and average 8 mph
winds [12], we estimate that on average 100 curies of tritium were
released per day for 30 days.  An accidental release of this magnitude
of man-made tritium sustained for several weeks on a nearly
uninhabited island is highly unlikely.  We conclude that this volcanic
eruption freed tritium produced by geological nuclear reactions.
 
Other HT data from the Mauna Loa station, such as the high reading in
the latter half of 1972, are also coincident with volcanic activity,
although a tritium-releasing bomb test also occurred in Russia in late
August.  A major spike in the atmospheric HT observed near Hawaii in Dec
1974 - June 1975 [10] coincides with another large volcanic eruption
on Hawaii Island, but the significance is again obscured by H-bomb
tests.  Finally, no significant deviations in HT reading are noted in
1976 or 1977 [10] when no volcanic activity is noted, except for
"gentle" activity at Kileau on September 17, 1977 [13].
 
OTHER EVIDENCES FOR COLD FUSION
 
Further evidence for cold nuclear fusion in condensed matter comes
                3       4
from studies of  He and  He in diamonds and metals.  Using laser-
slicing of diamonds, H. Craig (private communication) has measured the
                                4       3     4
absolute concentrations of both  He and  He.   He was found to be
smoothly distributed through the crystal as if it were derived from
                                     3
the environment.  On the other hand,  He was found to be concentrated
in spots implying in-situ formation.  Cold piezonuclear p-d or d-d
fusion provides a plausible explanation for these data.
 
                           3
Concentration anomalies of  He have also been reported in metal foils
                                    3
[14].  The spotty concentrations of  He suggest cold piezonuclear
                                     3
fusion as the origin of the observed  He.  Note that electrolytic
refining of the metals in deuterium-bearing water could have provided
conditions for cold nuclear fusion.  Among several possible
explanations, the authors [14] suggest an "analog" of muon catalysis.
We think they were close to the mark!
 
Cold nuclear fusion may be important in other celestial bodies besides
earth.  Jupiter, for example, radiates about twice as much heat as it
receives from the sun [1].  It is interesting to consider whether cold
nuclear fusion in the core of Jupiter, which is probably metallic
hydrogen plus iron silicate, could account for its excess heat.  Heat
is radiated at an approximate rate of 10E18 W, which could be produced
by p-d fusions occurring at a rate of 10E20(1/s) [1].  Assuming a
predominately hydrogen core of radius 4.6x10E9 cm, having a density
= 10 g/(cm*cm*cm) and a deuteron/proton ratio of roughly 10E-4, we
deduce a required p-d fusion rate of lambda  = 10E-19
                                           f
fusions/deuteron/second--in remarkable agreement with cold fusion
rates found in terrestrial conditions.
 
CONCLUSIONS
 
A new form of cold nuclear fusion has been observed during
electrolytic infusion of deuterons into metals.  While the need for
off-equilibrium conditions is clearly implied by our data, techniques
other than electrochemical may also be successful.  We have begun to
explore the use of ion implantation, and of elevated pressures and
temperatures mimicking geological conditions.
 
If deuteron-deuteron fusion can be catalyzed, then the d-t fusion
reaction is probably favored due to its much larger nuclear cross
section.  Thus, while the fusion rates observed so far are small,
the discovery of cold nuclear fusion in condensed matter opens the
possibility at least of a new path to fusion energy.
 
We acknowlege valuable contributions of Douglas Bennion, David Mince,
Lawrence Rees, Howard Vanfleet and J. C. Wang of Brigham Young
University, and of Mike Danos, Fraser Goff, Berndt Muller, Albert
Nier, Gote Ostlund, and Clinton Van Siclen.  We especially thank Alan
Anderson for advice on the data analysis and Harmon Craig for
continuing encouragement and for use of his data on diamonds before
their publication.
 
The research is supported by the Advanced Energy Projects Division of
the U.S. Department of Energy.
 
REFERENCES
 
 1. Van Siclen, C. D. & Jones, S. E. "Journal of Physics G. Nucl. Phys."
    12, 213-221 (1986).
 
 2. Jones, S. E. "Nature" 321, 127-133 (1986); Rafelski, J. & Jones,
    S. E. "Scientific American" 257, 84-89 (July 1987).
 
 3. Jensen, G. L., Dixon, D. R., Bruening, K. & Czirr, J. B. "Nucl.
    Inst. and Methods" 200, 406 (1984); and paper in preparation.
 
 4. MCNP: Monte Carlo Neutron and Photon Transport Code, CCC-200.
    Available from Radiation Shielding Information Center, Oak Ridge
    National Laboratory (Version 3).
 
 5. Bowman, R. C. Jr. in "Metal Hydrides" (ed. G. Bambakides) 109-144
    (New York, Plenum, 1981).
 
 6. Jones, S. E., et al. "Physical Review Letters" 51, 1757-1760
    (1983).
 
 7. Fyfe, W. S., Price, N. J., & Thompson, A. B. "Fluids in the Earth's
    Crust" (Elsevier, New York, 1978).
 
 8. Chapman, D. S. & Pollack, H. N. "Earth and Planet Sci. Lett" 28, 23
    (1975)
 
 9. Craig, H., Lupton, J. E., Welhan, J. A., & Proveda, R. "Geophys.
    Res. Lett." 5, 897 (1978); Lupton, J. E., & Craig, H. "Science"
    214, 13 (1981); Mamyrin, B. A. & Tolstikhin, L. N., "Helium
    Isotopes in Nature (Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1984).
 
10. Ostlund, H. G. & Mason, A. S. Atmospheric Tritium 1968-1984,
    Tritium Laboratory Report No. 14, University of Miami, Miami,
    Florida; Ostlund, H. G., private communication.
 
11. Bullard, F. M. "Volcanoes of the Earth", 2nd ed., (Univ. Texas
    Press, Austin, 1984).
 
12. U.S. Dept. of Commerce, "Climatological Data, Hawaii" 68, 29
    (1972).
 
13. Smithsonian Institution, "Volcanoes of the World", (Stroudsburg,
    P. A., Hutchinson Ross Publishing Co., 1981).
 
14. Mamyrin, B. A., Khabarin L. V. & Yudenich, V. S. "Sov. Phys.
    Dokl." 23, 581 (1978).
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Henry Spencer /  Re: Li6 plus D as a candidate fusion reaction
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Li6 plus D as a candidate fusion reaction
Date: 5 Apr 89 19:43:18 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <11750@ut-emx.UUCP> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
>...Lithium is mostly
>Li7.  Li6 is not exactly rare, but it is less than [one tenth] as common
>as Li7.
 
A further complication, which you will find mentioned in sufficiently good
reference books, is that much commercially-available lithium has been
through isotope refining to extract Li6 for nuclear-weapons use, so it is
Li6-depleted.  There is also, as I recall, some natural variation in the
Li6 percentage -- with a mass difference of 15%, natural processes can do
a little bit of isotope separation.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Scott Mueller /  Fusion news from misc.headlines
     
Originally-From: scott@pyrtech (Scott Hazen Mueller)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Fusion news from misc.headlines
Date: 5 Apr 89 20:22:07 GMT
Organization: Pyramid Technology Corp., Mountain View, CA

Originally-From: blackje@sunspot.steinmetz (Emmett Black)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,misc.headlines
Subject: Fusion Discovery Tentatively Confirmed
Date: 5 Apr 89 16:04:04 GMT
Organization: GE Research; Schenectady, NY  12345
 
This morning's issue of the Wall Street Journal carries an article
which indicates that scientists at the Brookhaven National Laboratory
has *tentatively* [ my emphasis ] confirmed the discovery of room temperature
fusion by Jones, Palmer, et.al. at Brigham Young.
 
"We're not absolutely certain" ... but they detected fusion generated
neutrons that are consistent with the Brigham Young result.
[ the Brigham Young group claims results that are significantly more
  modest than those claimed by Pons and Fleischmann... ]
 
This represents the first reported U.S. confirmation of the cold
fusion phenomenon;  Csikai and Sztaricskai at Debrecen (Hungary)
reported that they reproduced the phenomenon on 31 March 1989.
To date, no US laboratories have reported replication of the more
controversial Fleischmann-Ponds experiment.
A researcher at Lawrence Berkeley Labs says that if the finding is
confirmed "It would be the most significant discovery since fire."
(of course the local news media will report it in their "Money" segment
 and complain that it might put a few people out of work :-)
 
The Fleischmann-Ponds experiment remains controversial, and a good many
reputable scientists are skeptical;  one is quoted as saying:
	"Who knows, maybe Pons and Fleischmann have invented
	 the worlds most interesting battery"
 
The Wall Street Journal article is *must* reading (on page B4).
 
 
--Emmett
	J.E.Black; GE Research/K1-3C26; Schenectady, NY 12345
	blackje@crd.ge.com;   ...!uunet!steinmetz!crd!blackje
--
Scott Hazen Mueller, Pyramid RTOC          scott@pyrtech.pyramid.com
415-965-7200 x6006                         pyramid!pyrtech!scott
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Chuck Karish /  Palladium supply
     
Originally-From: karish@forel.stanford.edu (Chuck Karish)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Palladium supply
Date: 6 Apr 89 02:18:31 GMT
Organization: Mindcraft, Inc.

In article <1617@vicom.COM> lmb@vicom.COM (Larry Blair) wrote:
>OK.  The $64 question.  It has been said that only palladium will allow the
>kind of high density saturation that appears to be necessary.  Exactly how
>abundant is palladium?  Is there enough that the world's energy needs could
>be met, or are we talk about something that, like solar, is free power that
>costs too much.  Before you flame me, I'm talking orders of magnitude here.
 
Palladium is a platinum group metal.  It's not particularly scarce in
the solar system at large (round about one palladium atom per million
silicons, more abundant than silver), but it's harder to find on the
earth, since little of the earth's palladium is in the crust.
 
Palladium is present in roughly the same concentrations (order of
magnitude) as platinum in the rocks that produce platinum.  These rocks
are layered ultramafic intrusions and similar rocks.  Economically
attractive deposits of platinum group metals are present only at
isolated horizons in some of the world's ultramafic bodies, notably the
Bushveld in South Africa and the Stillwater in Montana.  I think
they're also produced as a by-product of nickel extraction from the
meteorite-related deposits at Sudbury, Ont.  Placer deposits of
platinum in several countries are probably the result of erosion of
mafic intrusions.
 
In short, palladium is about as abundant as platinum, and comes from
the same sources.  It's not going to become cheap any time soon.  It's
abundant enough that it's reasonable to think of using it for
industrial purposes.
 
The commercial success of cold fusion as a power source will probably
hinge on the efficiency of the process, rather than on the availability
of raw materials.  I hope we're talking about a higher power density
than we see from solar cells.
 
	Chuck Karish	hplabs!hpda!mindcrf!karish	(415) 493-7277
			karish@forel.stanford.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Mark Hopkins /  Lattice parameters
     
Originally-From: markh@csd4.milw.wisc.edu (Mark William Hopkins)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Lattice parameters
Date: 6 Apr 89 02:43:55 GMT
Organization: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

It would be nice to give a set of lattice parameters, to show the position of
the deuterium atoms within the palladium lattice cell to better determine
what's going on with this reaction.
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Mike Taylor /  Thermal/energy balance
     
Originally-From: mat@uts.amdahl.com (Mike Taylor)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Thermal/energy balance
Date: 6 Apr 89 03:15:16 GMT
Organization: Amdahl Corporation, Sunnyvale CA

As a layman here, I'd like some help with my understanding of what appears
to be going on.
 
First, with normal H2O, we have the following balance:
 
Energy input = heat output + energy expended to electrolyze H2O into H2
and O2 gases.
 
Heat output is relatively small as a fraction of energy input, since
considerable energy is expended to separate the H2O.  This energy can be
recovered by burning the H2 and the O2, of course.
 
Now, according to P&F, if I electrolyze D2O into D2 and O2, "heat output"
as per above equation, is 112% of energy input.  The electrolysis of D2
and O2 is a "freebie" therefore, and I can add the recoverable energy to
my breakeven calculation. So that with P&F, when power input = 1 watt,
then heat output = 1.12w and electrolysis energy = 3.88w. OK so far?
 
Obviously careful calorimetry was needed to determine this. Did BYU
perform the calorimetry? Did they verify gas volumes, etc. or did they
just focus on neutron production?
--
Mike Taylor                               ...!{hplabs,amdcad,sun}!amdahl!mat
 
[ This may not reflect my opinion, let alone anyone else's.  ]
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Vincent Cate /  Fleischmann and Pons paper
     
Originally-From: vac@sam.cs.cmu.edu (Vincent Cate)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Fleischmann and Pons paper
Date: 6 Apr 89 01:18:47 GMT
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI

 
If somebody will FAX me a copy of the paper by Fleischmann and Pons, I
will scan it in and make it available to the net via ftp.  Compress does a
good enough job on postscript files that I will just compress the PS files
and people can ftp these.
 
Please send me email if you are willing to fax me a copy.  I will post
after I have found someone, and as soon and the files are ready.
 
 
   -- Vince
 
P.S. My fax number is (412) 681-1998, if you are not worried about sending
an extra copy then you need not send email first.
--
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 /  Paul /  Pons speech in Indiana
     
Originally-From: pmd@dptcdc.datapoint.com (Paul D'Eath)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Pons speech in Indiana
Date: 5 Apr 89 19:13:55 GMT
Organization: Datapoint Canada, Toronto, ON

 
The Toronto Globe & Mail for 5/4/89 carried a story entitled
"Dangerous fusion experiment caused two chemists to worry."
Apparently reporting on a speech given by Stanley Pons on 4/4/89
in Bloomington Indiana, the gist of the article is that Pons
and Fleischman "circumvented normal scientific reporting channels
to publicize an apparent breakthrough in nuclear fusion because
they were afraid colleagues might blow themselves up by trying
to duplicate the experiment."
 
At this meeting (locale is not given in this report), Pons stated
that "one experiment at the University (UofU) caused an explosion
when the palladium metal used to fuse hydrogen nuclei together
apparently caught fire, dousing the laboratory with low-level
radiation.  He said that in at least one subsequent experiment,
the heat produced by the experiment threatened to 'runaway' -
an uncontrollable reaction."
 
He claimed that neither he nor Fleischman had been discreet in
their excitement at their discovery and had "talked too much."
People who heard the rumours were beginning to create their own
experiments, and at this stage the original discoverers decided
in the interests of safety to hold an early press conference rather
than publish the results in a refereed scientific journal.
 
Other interesting details emerging from this report are as follows:
 
[Pons] "outlined safety precautions that should be taken in the
size and shape of the metal [palladium] rod used, the variations
in temperature and in electrical input, and he cautioned against
using tritium, a radioactive element.  The problem is that, the
larger the rod, the longer the saturation process takes - up to
several weeks in some instances."
 
Needless to say, copyright to this story belongs to the Globe & Mail,
and I am just providing a paraphrase of the more salient and interesting
details.
--
Paul M. D'Eath         |  INTERNET :  pmd@toronto.datapoint.com
Datapoint Canada Inc.  |  uucp     :  {uunet,utzoo}!dptcdc!pmd
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Mike Taylor /  Re: Jones and Palmer Paper
     
Originally-From: mat@uts.amdahl.com (Mike Taylor)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Jones and Palmer Paper
Date: 6 Apr 89 04:34:31 GMT
Organization: Amdahl Corporation, Sunnyvale CA

Many thanks for posting the paper. I see no mention of calorimetry. So
this paper is in agreement with Pons & Fleischmann on the neutron
production, but doesn't mention the thermal balance. So is it fair to
conclude that the observation of low rates of neutron production in
palladium or titanium is mutually confirmed?  And that the calorimetric
observations of P&F are neither confirmed or refuted?  Since the
heat involved is very small (500ma at 25 vdc = 12.5w) the observed
difference in temperature rise would be also small.  Since P&F thermal
output only equals 112% of input, the observed temperature rise due to
the "P&F effect" would be that required to dissipate the difference between
normal thermal losses in electrolysis due to ohmic heating, etc. (say
30% of input?) and the observed 112%. So with no P&F effect, thermal
losses would be (say) 6w. With P&F, they would be 14w. But you get
more D2 and O2 gas in the P&F case, too. Or do I misunderstand their
result?
 
 
--
Mike Taylor                               ...!{hplabs,amdcad,sun}!amdahl!mat
 
[ This may not reflect my opinion, let alone anyone else's.  ]
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Martin Ryba /  Re: The deal
     
Originally-From: mfryba@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Martin Francis Ryba)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: The deal
Date: 6 Apr 89 04:32:34 GMT
Organization: Princeton University, NJ

$.02:
  I saw a story on cold fusion on the CBS Evening News (mainstream
enough?) with a noticeably uncomfortable Dan Rather *very carefully*
reading a short script (~1 min.) with a lame piece of artwork in the
background.  It has gotten some press;  actually, about all it currently
deserves/desires at the moment.  Give the thousands of groups around the
world the chance to *really* verify this claim without worrying about
patents/press releases before we really go nutso.
 
The story I referred to was broadcast ~1 week ago.
 
Marty Ryba (slave physics grad student)
They don't care if I exist, let alone what my opinions are!
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Thomas Gilg /  Re: excluding political discussions
     
Originally-From: tomg@hpcvlx.HP.COM (Thomas J. Gilg)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: excluding political discussions
Date: 5 Apr 89 18:01:37 GMT
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Co., Corvallis, OR, USA

> [quotes others who (a) don't want OPEC/fission/nuke/terrorism discussions,
>  and those who argue that discussions of science should include the social
>  ramifications]
 
When talking about fusion, I think it's impossible to divorce this group
from political ramifications.  I don't see the harm in posting such
things in this notes group PROVIDED THEY ARE CLEARLY IDENTIFIED BY
THEIR TITLE.
 
      Thomas Gilg
tomg%hp-pcd@hplabs.hp.com
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Brian Godfrey /  Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
     
Originally-From: brian@sequent.UUCP (Brian Godfrey)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
Date: 5 Apr 89 17:09:10 GMT
Organization: Sequent Computer Systems, Inc

>Here's a question I'd like to toss into discussion:  What would
>cheap, safe, locally fueled energy do to Japan?  No one would be be
>dependent on the outside world for their energy anymore.  We might
>further postulate that abundant energy could make processes like
>recycling much more practical, and thus reduce dependence on outside
>materials.
 
   International trade is a very powerful force for peace. International
isolationism is a very powerful force for war. I would be very concerned
about any situation which allowed a country to isolate itself from the
world.
   My opinions.
--
 
--Brian M. Godfrey
  Sequent Computer Systems Inc.
  !tektronix!sequent!brian
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Jeff Boeing /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: abcscagz@csuna.csun.edu (Jeff Boeing)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 6 Apr 89 03:39:10 GMT
Organization: CSU Northridge

In article <1989Apr2.145310.29132@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester.e
u (Paul Dietz) writes:
>
>  Solid state fusion is immoral because...
>
>  a. Palladium comes from S. Africa.
 
It also comes from RUSSIA, which is even worse!   :-)
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / D Appelquist /  Cold Fusion?
     
Originally-From: da1n+@andrew.cmu.edu (Daniel K. Appelquist)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Cold Fusion?
Date: 6 Apr 89 04:51:47 GMT
Organization: Class of '91, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA

Ok-  According to my source in the Yale physics department, "the general opinion
is that the Pons/Fleischman stuff is crap."  (sorry to put a damper on the
discussion.)  HOWEVER, there is work going on at the Yale Nuclear Structure Lab
right now in an effort to duplicate the experiment.  (As soon as I find out
those results, I'll post them.)
 
My source also says to: "keep in mind that the fusion of deuterium nuclei in the
deuterium  mollecule will always happen at some rate---it is the quesion how
large the rate is."
 
Any comments from physics guru's out there?  (I'm not a physicist myself, and as
such can only parrot what I'm told.)  :-)
 
        Dan A.
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Jef Poskanzer /  Cold fusion: our story so far...
     
Originally-From: pokey@well.UUCP (Jef Poskanzer)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Cold fusion: our story so far...
Date: 6 Apr 89 05:15:49 GMT
Organization: Paratheo-Anametamystikhood Of Eris Esoteric, Ada Lovelace Cabal

The Jones and Palmer paper is great.  Possibly the most significant part
of it is the correlation of atmospheric tritium with volcanic eruptions.
Others have found He3 in volcanoes, diamonds, etc., but that's not
significant since many chemical processes can enrich or deplete He3
relative to He4.  Tritium is very significant because the only way for
it to be there is a *recent* nuclear reaction.  I guess all the folks
measuring He3 in volcanoes never thought to check for tritium?
 
I'm still looking for a preprint of the Pons and Fleischmann paper.
 
Here's a summary of the story so far: both the BYU group (Jones, Palmer
et al.) and the UU group (Pons and Fleischmann) have observed fusion
neutrons.  They both get about the same rate, 10**3 - 10**4 neutrons
per second.  This is way too low for any practical power generation,
but it is still of tremendous scientific interest; comparable to the
discovery of iridium in the K-T boundary clay.  Also, no one has yet
tried using tritium along with the deuterium -- this reaction should
go about 10**4 times faster, which is getting up into the practical
power area.
 
A number of other groups have duplicated this part.
 
In addition to the neutrons, the UU group has observed some extra heat.
This heat is a billion times more than would be generated by fusion at
the rate implied by the neutrons.  It is maybe a factor of ten more than
the obvious chemical explanations can account for.  If the extra heat
turns out to be a real live nuclear effect, then the Golden Age is upon
us.
 
No one has yet duplicated this part.
 
Is this a fair summary?
 
I'm still skeptical about the heat.
---
Jef
 
            Jef Poskanzer   jef@helios.ee.lbl.gov   ...well!pokey
 "Science throws her treasures, not like a capricious fairy into the lap of a
  favored few, but into the laps of all humanity, with a lavish extravagance
                that no legend ever dreamed of." -- Ernst Mach
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / daniel mocsny /  Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
     
Originally-From: dmocsny@uceng.UC.EDU (daniel mocsny)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
Date: 5 Apr 89 22:19:30 GMT
Organization: Univ. of Cincinnati, College of Engg.

In article <1989Apr4.095659.672@mntgfx.mentor.com>, mbutts@mntgfx.mentor
com (Mike Butts) writes:
> Here's a question I'd like to toss into discussion:  What would
> cheap, safe, locally fueled energy do to Japan?
 
Permit it to conquer the world. Time to start those Japanese Language
Lessons, folks.
 
Dan Mocsny				Snail:
Internet: dmocsny@uceng.UC.EDU		Dept. of Chemical Engng. M.L. 171
513/751-6824 (home)			University of Cincinnati
513/556-2007 (lab)			Cincinnati, Ohio 45221-0171
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 /  andrew /  Volcano!
     
Originally-From: andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew)
Newsgroups: sci.environment,alt.fusion
Subject: Volcano!
Date: 6 Apr 89 07:46:03 GMT
Organization: National Semiconductor, Santa Clara

 
Having just read the BYU cold fusion paper (Thanks for the typing!) I am
wondering whether we will see an environmentalist lobby demanding that
Congress shut down all volcanos, and camping out on Etna etc. until their
demands are met?
It seems that all life has lived in harmony with gobs of tritium for
quite a long time. I am wondering if removing tritium produces a genetically-
induced attack of withdrawal symptoms? Perhaps a genetic intolerance to
tritium killed the dinosaurs? Will this replace calcium as the favourite
breakfast cereal additive? Or would you let YOUR daughter marry a man who
has lived around Mt. St. Helens?
=====
Andrew Palfreyman 		USENET: ...{this biomass}!nsc!logic!andrew
National Semiconductor M/S D3969, 2900 Semiconductor Dr., PO Box 58090,
Santa Clara, CA 95052-8090 ; 408-721-4788 		there's many a slip
							'twixt cup and lip
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Ashish Vikram /  need Fleischmann and Pons paper
     
Originally-From: arj@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Ashish Vikram)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: need Fleischmann and Pons paper
Date: 6 Apr 89 07:52:57 GMT
Organization: Purdue University

I don't know if the Fleischmann and Pons paper has been posted on this net
before. I would be grateful if somebody would e-mail a copy of the paper to
me. I would prefer a troff version but a text version would do too.
 
Thanks,
Ashish
e-mail: av@purdue.cs.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Michael McClary /  Re: So how do we get rid of by products?
     
Originally-From: michael@xanadu.COM (Michael McClary)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: So how do we get rid of by products?
Date: 6 Apr 89 10:03:37 GMT
Organization: Xanadu Operating Company, Palo Alto, CA

In article <338@taniwha.UUCP> paul@taniwha.UUCP (Paul Campbell) writes:
>So suppose we are building a fusion engine of some sort - we have to:
>
>	1) squirt D into palladium etc
>	2) wait 'till it's "full" so that fusion starts
>	3) collect the power .... :-)
>
>so now what happens? at some point the fusion by-products start to build up
>inside the palladium, can they get out? Maybe they diffuse out at a slower
>rate than that at which D diffuses in (after all they have larger masses etc)?
>
>So eventually we have a lump of palladium so full of He4 (or whatever) that
>it's not much use.
 
 - Use thin sheets or tubes, sintered powder, etc.  The mev-or-so deposited
   on the helium kicks it out into the surrounding fluid (where you want
   the heat and helium to go anyhow).
 
 - Or don't bother:
 
    - The He(3) and He(4) will form neutral atoms and diffuse out
      on their own, or be pushed out by H(2) and H(3), which are
      being driven in under electrostatic pressure.
 
    - The H(3) won't, but it will probably fuse again, and
      H(3) + H(2) -> He(4) + n is more energetic than
      H(2) + H(2) -> (H(3) + H(1)) / (He(3) + n), as I recall.
 
    - n will fuse on its own, typically with the first thing it
      encounters after it slows down (except He(4)).  If it
      encounters H(1,2,or3) it just promotes the reaction.  If
      it encounters Pd or O it may become a radiation hazard,
      but at least it isn't poisioning the reaction.
 
    - H(1) might be a problem, if it doesn't end up being fused with
      H(2), H(3), or n.  But it is being kicked out, too, so it's
      a slow problem.  (And if things like Li(6) and Li(7) are
      participating in the reaction, all bets on H(1) are off,
      anyhow.)
 
(Hmmm... I wonder how much of the reaction is from H(1) or n zipping
 through a dense lattice of H(2) at an appreciable fraction of 2.2 mev?
 Talk about overcoming a columb barrier...)
 
Disclaimer:  I'm not a nuclear physicist, and invite corrections from
those who are.  I'm after truth, not egoboo.
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / C Daffinger /  Fusion talk in Indiana
     
Originally-From: cdaf@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu (Charles Daffinger)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Fusion talk in Indiana
Date: 6 Apr 89 10:11:15 GMT
Organization: Indiana University, Bloomington

 
Regretfully, I missed the talk (I heard about it after it happened... ) but
here's what the local rag (The Herald Telephone) reports.  These are
relevant excerpts, copied w/o permission:
 
[...]
 
"... According to Fleschman, quoted in an AP article Tuesdey, five
labs have produced positive results and 6 had negative results.
 
[...]
 
"Dr. Pons says that once sufficient time has passed to allow many deuterium
atoms to take up positions within the Pd lattice, the statistical possibility
arises that some fo them will overcome their huge mututal repulsion to `tunnel'
toward each other and fuse, thereby creating tritium, heleum, neutrons, and
heat energy."
 
Pons told his IU audience that he and Fleischmann megan their experiments
in 1972, after noticing a "strange phenomenon" during research.  Ultimately
they came up with their "far-fetched and simple experiment".
 
He warned that the cold fusion work can be dangerous and should not be
attempted without contacting him or safety experts.  In 1984, when using a
1 cm cube of Pd instead of the thin wire they later tried, their device
ignited and damaged a laboratory hood and the conctrete floor.
 
Heat buildup was the "most incredible" aspect of the experiments, because it was
"a billion times more than" can be explained by reactions other than fusion,
Pons said.  "We cannot imagine any other reaction than a nuclear reaction
that can account for the heat.....
 
"There is no conceivable chemical process that could give you this much energy."
 
He added, however, that a nuclar reaction in addition to fusion may be going on.
He couldn't explain what the mystery reaction might be.
 
[...]
 
-charles
 
 
--
Charles Daffinger  >Take me to the river, Drop me in the water<  (812) 339-7354
cdaf@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu              {pur-ee,rutgers,pyramid,ames}!iuvax!cdaf
Home of the Whitewater mailing list:    whitewater-request@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Richard Pavelle /  Cold fusion
     
Originally-From: rp@XN.LL.MIT.EDU (Richard Pavelle)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Cold fusion
Date: 6 Apr 89 13:15:47 GMT
Organization: MIT Lincoln Laboratory, Lexington, MA

 
 
 
The latest Science News (unfortunately dated April 1) on Page 196 has
their (SN's) first article on the subject. It is a good review and the
only new bit to me was their interview with Fleischmann in which he
admits that the "cold fusion" could be "a horrible chain of
misinterpretations and accidents".  --
Richard Pavelle         UUCP: ...ll-xn!rp
                        ARPANET: rp@XN.LL.MIT.EDU
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 /  James_J_Kowalc /  Re: Cold fusion: chemical explanation?
     
Originally-From: James_J_Kowalczyk@cup.portal.com
Newsgroups: sci.chem,sci.physics,sci.space,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion: chemical explanation?
Date: 6 Apr 89 06:33:23 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

stolfi@jumbo.dec.com (Jorge Stolfi) writes:
        [portions deleted]
>If this makes sense, then the extra energy detected by F&P is
>energy that was stored into the electrode during the charging period.
        [more deleted]
>Does this make any sense? (As you can tell, I am no chemist.)
>
>                Jorge Stolfi @ DEC Systems Research Center
 
Pons & Fleischman have apparently taken into acount all the energy
put into the system during the multi-week "charge-up" time.
The energy out is still calculated as more than put in.
 
Jim Kowalczyk
Kowalczyk@chemistry.utah.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 /  James_J_Kowalc /  Re: So how do we get rid of by products?
     
Originally-From: James_J_Kowalczyk@cup.portal.com
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: So how do we get rid of by products?
Date: 6 Apr 89 06:46:40 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup) writes:
 
>        Does anyone know whether you can stop the fusion once it starts?
>The UofU guys said they had their meltdown when they thought they were
>shutting down the experiment.
 
Yes, once the current is turned off, the energy production stops,
according to Pons.  They had a "meltdown" when they turned the current
down from 250 milliamps to 125 milliamps and left the apparatus
unattended over-night.  They speculate that the sudden halving of the
current resulted in a sudden drop in voltage between the center and
the surface of the palladium, which caused the absorbed Deuterium
to rush towards the surface.
 
Jim Kowalczyk
Kowalczyk@chemistry.utah.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 /  fusion@zorch.U /  Submission for Alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: fusion@zorch.UU.NET
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Submission for Alt.fusion
Date: 5 Apr 89 16:22:43 GMT
Organization: Alt.fusion/Mail Gateway

in response to several items on the net:
 
>will there be a market for petroleum products.
 
yes. certainly. will probably even still need gasoline
for quite some time.  the first impact we'll probably
see is power generation plants using fusion rather than
gas/oil/coal... until we get a battery breakthrough, we'll
probably not see all THAT many electric cars for a time.
 
>(semi-quote) What will the oil companies do? (semi-quote is a
  punctuation mark used mostly by people in Washington, DC.)
 
big companies are in business to stay in business...
(just like the main purpose of any organization is to continue to exist;
 does anybody remember the original charter of the "March of Dimes" ?)
Take the tobacco companies as an example;  it is generally recognized
that tobacco is pretty bad stuff, and is not acceptable in public...
but did you notice what the tobacco companies are doing? -- they bought
OTHER companies that make 7-up, crackers, and other stuff....
looks like they are preparing for a day (in the near future, i hope)
when they can no longer continue to exist on tobacco....
 
big oil companies are no different;  they want to continue to exist;
and they want to continue to keep their jobs and paychecks.
they will still be able to sell oil;  but I suspect that they will
broaden their base a bit -- and will be recognized as "Energy Companies"
as a previous writer observed.
[maybe they will supply fusion plants to electric companies?] :-)
 
--Emmett
 
 
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Kin Wong /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: kfw@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (Kin F Wong)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 5 Apr 89 19:20:39 GMT
Organization: Columbia University

 
Actually, jobs will just get shifted to the new industry. People can
always be retrained.
 
--
Kin F. Wong             INTERNET: kfw@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu
                        UUCP    : columbia!cunixb.columbia.edu!kfw
Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the double lock will keep;
May no brick through the window break and no one rob me till I awake.
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Phillip Wayne /  Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
     
Originally-From: zardoz@apple.com (Phillip Wayne)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
Date: 6 Apr 89 18:00:37 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer, Inc.

In article <1134@rpi.edu> ncc1701@pawl.rpi.edu (Mark O. Chadwick) writes:
> I seem to recall something about a bomber being flown in the late 40's or
> early 50's that used NUCLEAR power.  It's a good thing that didn't crash,
> or a mess would certainly have been generated!
 
Unless I remember wrong (about 80% sure that I don't misremember) this was
a proposal only by one of the 'brains' of the military (excuse me if that
is a contradiction in terms). Never got off the ground (literally) because
of the weight of the required shielding.
 
Thank the gods for small favors.
 
*************************************
* When you do it to me, it's discrimination
* When I do it to you, it's AA
*************************************
-- These are my ideas. Oy vey, are they mine.
-- zardoz
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / bass randale /  Re: Cold Fusion?
     
Originally-From: crb7q@hudson.acc.virginia.edu (bass cameron randale)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion?
Date: 6 Apr 89 16:05:25 GMT
Organization: University of Virginia, Charlottesville

In article <wYCinXy00W0W44gkYd@andrew.cmu.edu> da1n+@andrew.cmu.edu
(Daniel K. Appelquist) writes:
>Ok-  According to my source in the Yale physics department, "the general opinion
>is that the Pons/Fleischman stuff is crap."  (sorry to put a damper on the
>discussion.)  HOWEVER, there is work going on at the Yale Nuclear Structure Lab
>right now in an effort to duplicate the experiment.  (As soon as I find out
>those results, I'll post them.)
 
 
 
      .... Just a little historical perspective.   Max Planck thought
      quantum mechanics was "nonsense".
 
                                    dale bass
 
 
       crb7q@virgnia.edu     or      crb7q@hudson.acc.virginia.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Ethan Vishniac /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 6 Apr 89 14:18:33 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <1877@csuna.csun.edu>, abcscagz@csuna.csun.edu (Jeff Boeing) writes:
> In article <1989Apr2.145310.29132@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester
edu (Paul Dietz) writes:
> >
> >  Solid state fusion is immoral because...
> >
> >  a. Palladium comes from S. Africa.
>
> It also comes from RUSSIA, which is even worse!   :-)
 
But the real killer is that the only North American source of any size
is in *Canada*!  Next thing you know they'll be asking us to accept
that funny-looking money of theirs. :-)
 
 
 
 
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / T Reynolds /  cold fusion, control experiment
     
Originally-From: ch-tkr@wasatch.utah.edu (Timothy K Reynolds)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: cold fusion, control experiment
Date: 6 Apr 89 17:40:52 GMT
Organization: University of Utah CS Dept

As reported in todays SLC Tribune (4/6/89):
 
".... B. Stanley Pons said Wednesday he has tried his experiment with ordinary
water and it produced no significant heat, which could be evidence that the
heating process (seen with D2O) is indeed nuclear and not chemical.
 
"But he emphasized, as he has all along, that much more information is needed.
 
" `That's certainly the first thing you have to do,' U. physicist Michael
Salamon said of Dr. Pons' `control experiment' with ordinary water."
 
I don't like using the media as my primary source of technical information,
but ......:-)  Anyway I'm sure Enquiring Minds want to know.
 
ch-tkr@wasatch.utah.edu				Behind the Zion Curtain
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Paul Dietz /  Palladium metallurgy
     
Originally-From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Palladium metallurgy
Date: 6 Apr 89 18:03:03 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

I looked up a little information about the hydride phases of
palladium.  Palladium, on absorbing hydrogen, first passes through the
"alpha" phase.  It then goes into the "beta" phase.  There is a
miscibility gap, meaning that the maximum percentage hydrogen in the
alpha phase is much less than the minimum percentage of hydrogen in
the beta phase.  The phases also have different lattice spacings.
 
The upshot of this is that hydrogen cycling of palladium creates
numerous lattice dislocations as the beta phase nucleates, grows,
shrinks and disappears.  Pure palladium cannot be used as a membrane
for hydrogen purification for this reason -- it degrades quickly.
 
However, alloying Pd with many elements reduces and (for large enough
alloying element concentration) eventually eliminates the miscibility
gap.  Perhaps most interesting from the point of view of fusion are
alloys containing titanium.  These alloys have a slightly *smaller*
lattice spacing than pure Pd, and for Ti >~ 8% have no miscibility
gap.  Many alloys also have higher hydrogen diffusivity (I'm not sure
if the Ti alloys do).
 
	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Ethan Vishniac /  Re: Fleischmann and Pons paper
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fleischmann and Pons paper
Date: 6 Apr 89 15:35:14 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

A number of people wrote to me requesting preprints and additional
information.  I have already posted the experimental section
of their paper.  Through a misunderstanding a list of people who
asked for preprints through the US mail was lost.  In an attempt
to make it up to all of you I have sent a copy by Fax to Vincent
Cate, who has offered to make it available via anonymous ftp.
I am actually a little surprised that I got a copy well before
a number of people with a more direct professional interest.
 
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Ethan Vishniac /  Re: cold fusion, control experiment
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: cold fusion, control experiment
Date: 6 Apr 89 18:56:54 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <1542@wasatch.utah.edu>, ch-tkr@wasatch.utah.edu (Timothy K Reynolds) writes:
> As reported in todays SLC Tribune (4/6/89):
>
> ".... B. Stanley Pons said Wednesday he has tried his experiment with ordinary
> water and it produced no significant heat, which could be evidence that the
> heating process (seen with D2O) is indeed nuclear and not chemical.
 
This answers one of my major questions, but.....
 
Given that deuterium is twice as heavy as ordinary hydrogen it doesn't
seem inconceivable to me that its weight could affect its chemistry
(e.g. its behavior when dissolved in pd).  Any chemists out there willing
to comment?
 
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Vincent Cate /  F and P paper via FTP soon
     
Originally-From: vac@sam.cs.cmu.edu (Vincent Cate)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: F and P paper via FTP soon
Date: 6 Apr 89 19:25:56 GMT
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI

 
The Fleischmann and Pons paper should be ready by 5 pm EST
(there is a good chance that you are reading this after 5).
 
 
First to get the 15 files using ftp:
 
    ftp sam.cs.cmu.edu
    anonymous
    anonymous
    cd fusion
    binary
    ls
    mget *
    quit
 
 
Then to print it on a unix system with zcat (compress) and a
postscript printer:
 
    foreach FILE (`ls p.*.ps.Z`)
       zcat $FILE | lpr
    end
 
 
The compressed files are about 30K each and the uncompressed
files would be about 300K each.
 
 
 
--
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Henry Spencer /  Re: Why is fusion good?
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Why is fusion good?
Date: 6 Apr 89 17:45:40 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <Apr.4.11.55.14.1989.3450@steeleye.rutgers.edu> schaffer@stee
eye.rutgers.edu (Cullen Schaffer) writes:
>I've always thought that the reason fusion is such a big deal is that
>it gets us away from dealing with nasty radioactive fuels and waste:
>hydrogen in, helium out.  But now I think I understand that the
>high-energy neutron emissions from a fusion reaction create
>radioactive materials.  Is that true?  Is dealing with fusion waste
>somehow easier than dealing with fission waste?...
 
High-energy neutrons do indeed induce radioactivity in most materials.
There are fusion reactions that do not generate significant numbers of
neutrons, and hence don't have the waste problem.  They are harder to
ignite, however, so current experiments tend not to use them.  If cold
fusion can be made to work with deuterium, possibly it can be made to
work with the aneutronic reactions as well.  This may have to wait until
there is some theoretical understanding of it, though.
 
One would expect somewhat less of a waste problem with fusion, also,
because at least there aren't any fission products.  Much of the high-
level waste from fission is spent fuel.
 
It's also relevant that the F&P experiment, if the reports are taken at
face value, does not generate nearly as many neutrons as it "should".
 
So yes, there is a waste problem, at least in current schemes, but yes,
it's not as serious as for fission.
 
Contrary to media hype, the fission-waste problem is not technologically
intractable.  Indeed, it's less serious than the chemical-waste problem
for coal-burning plants -- specifically, the arsenic content of stack-
scrubber sludge -- because quantities are so much smaller.  The problems
with fission waste are more political than technical.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Henry Spencer /  Re: Heavy Water
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Heavy Water
Date: 6 Apr 89 17:51:38 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <2206@laidbak.UUCP> rayd@laidbak.UUCP (Ray Dueland) writes:
>How is deuterium obtained from water?  I would imagine some type of
>column chromatography, but I'm only guessing.  Does water have to be
>broken down in to hydrogen (deuterium) and oxygen first?
 
The simplest way of getting heavy water (from which deuterium can be
had by electrolysis) is just to electrolyze a whole lot of water.
Deuterium is a little harder to electrolyze than ordinary hydrogen,
so it tends to stay behind in the leftover water.  This is how
heavy water was made in the early days, and it's still how it's purified.
Modern production uses chemical methods -- running the hydrogen through
a chemical reaction over and over to exploit slight differences in the
reaction rates -- in the early stages, because electrolysis uses huge
amounts of power and hence is costly.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Henry Spencer /  nuclear aircraft
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: nuclear aircraft
Date: 6 Apr 89 17:53:53 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <1134@rpi.edu> ncc1701@pawl.rpi.edu (Mark O. Chadwick) writes:
>I seem to recall something about a bomber being flown in the late 40's or
>early 50's that used NUCLEAR power.  It's a good thing that didn't crash...
 
There was an experimental B-36 that flew with an operating reactor aboard,
although the reactor was purely a test device and did not power the aircraft.
Considerable precautions were taken against the possibility of a crash.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy6 cudenhenry cudfnHenry cudlnSpencer cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.03 / C Beshers /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: beshers@cs.cs.columbia.edu (Clifford Beshers)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 3 Apr 89 20:02:20 GMT
Organization: Columbia University Computer Science

In article <1694@thor.acc.stolaf.edu> larsonjs@thor.acc.stolaf.edu
(James S. Larson @ St. Olaf College) writes:
 
   Has anyone given any thought to the reactions of the oil companies and OPEC
   countries to the new developments in fusion?  They must certainly realize
   that practical fusion will put them out of business.
 
I've been wondering if this is really true.  Petroleum is used as
a material product by the plastics industry.  What percentage of
oil is used as a material rather than a fuel?  How many material
uses would be found for petroleum if it's price suddenly went
down?
 
--
 ----------------------------------------------
Cliff Beshers
Columbia University Computer Science Department
beshers@cs.columbia.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Gordon Garb /  Re: nuclear aircraft
     
Originally-From: ggarb@apple.com (Gordon Garb)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: nuclear aircraft
Date: 7 Apr 89 03:11:25 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer, Inc.

In article <1989Apr6.175353.1984@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry
Spencer) writes:
> In article <1134@rpi.edu> ncc1701@pawl.rpi.edu (Mark O. Chadwick) writes:
> >I seem to recall something about a bomber being flown in the late 40's
or
> >early 50's that used NUCLEAR power.  It's a good thing that didn't
crash...
>
> There was an experimental B-36 that flew with an operating reactor
aboard,
> although the reactor was purely a test device and did not power the
aircraft.
> Considerable precautions were taken against the possibility of a crash.
In the late 1950's, early 1960's, plans were drawn up for a
nuclear-powered train.  I don't
know how far this went beyond an academic exercise;  I've seen an HO-scale
model of the
proposed "atomic-locomotive", and I have a copy (somewhere) of the
university study.
 
/Gordon Garb
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Jon Anderson /  Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
     
Originally-From: hendrix@cisunx.UUCP (Jon Anderson)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
Date: 6 Apr 89 21:19:49 GMT
Organization: Univ. of Pittsburgh, Comp & Info Sys

In article <13896@sequent.UUCP> brian@crg1.UUCP (Brian Godfrey) writes:
>
>   International trade is a very powerful force for peace. International
>isolationism is a very powerful force for war. I would be very concerned
>about any situation which allowed a country to isolate itself from the
>world.
 
Even if fusion power would allow the Japanese an independent source of
energy, they are still EXTREMELY dependent on foreign raw materials and
foreign markets to trade in.  I don't predict any problems.  The
Japanese are not foolish enough to cut off their nose to spite their
face.
 
					-Jon Anderson
 
--
 
doyoualwaysreadstupidmessagesthatpeopleputintheirsignatures?
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / David Preisler /  re: fusion- synthesize petroleum
     
Originally-From: dwp@mtune.ATT.COM (David Preisler)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: re: fusion- synthesize petroleum
Date: 7 Apr 89 01:51:22 GMT
Organization: AT&T ISL Middletown NJ USA

petroleum products, however it does mean an end to *imported* petroleum.
 
All we need to do is extract H from water [ using our cheap inexhaustable
power supply ], and then  synthesize it into anything we need: methane,
octane, plastics, house paint, or whatever.
 
 
 
David William Preisler
  System Administrator
 
AT&T Bell Laboratories     Email: att!mtune!dwp.ATT.COM
     200 Laurel Avenue
Middletown,  NJ  07748     Phone: (201) 957-2594
cudkeys:
cuddy7 cudendwp cudfnDavid cudlnPreisler cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Ronald Fischer /  Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
     
Originally-From: fischer@arisia.Xerox.COM (Ronald A. Fischer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
Date: 6 Apr 89 21:01:08 GMT
Organization: Xerox PARC

The air force had a small fission reactor out in the Southwest
somewhere.  It was portable an a dolly of some sort and used kerosene
as shielding (those dense little hydrocardbon molecules).  It was
wheeled into a plane and flown around for a while as some sort of
test.  I can't see the use myself, but it was done.
 
There was a time when GE (I think) was developing an aircraft turbine
that used, for the expansion phase, a heat exchanger using liquid
metal from a reactor.  This was successfully ground tested.
 
Overall the atomic bomber designs got less and less agressive as
reality set in.  In the end they were not going to be any faster than
regular turbojet aircraft, and exposure rates limited the amount of
time alot (also a feature originally was that the planes could stay up
without refueling for long periods).
 
Finally, missles made them obsolete.
 
(ron)
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / E Hoogerbeets /  Social implications of fusion
     
Originally-From: edwin@hcr.UUCP (Edwin Hoogerbeets)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Social implications of fusion
Date: 6 Apr 89 20:58:51 GMT
Organization: HCR Corporation, Toronto

Can someone in the know please post the prices for palladium and
deuterium? I suspect you can get nice size chunks (or flasks full)
for under $100,000. (I mean today's prices, not in 2 years!)
 
Let us suppose that the above ingredients, along with LiOD *can* be
used for fusion.
 
The above price is well within the budget of many small organizations
and even within the budget of some affluent individuals. Including
terrorists.
 
Is there enough energy released from this fusion to create a bomb? (I
don't know myself) Is it within the capability of terrorist
organizations to become nuclear powers?
 
Even if there isn't enough energy to create a bomb, this will be the
question on the public's mind as more news comes available from Utah.
This question could make it difficult to develop this fusion further
because of opposition from people with small minds.
 
What if this method is not fusion, and merely a very good battery. I
think that it will be significant anyways. Imagine cars or busses
running on deuterium, no pollution involved and only needing to be
refeuled every few months or years even. Imagine space probes that could
last for decades, instead of merely years collecting data from Pluto
or the Sun's polar orbit or even past the bounds our solar system.
 
In any case, I am anxiously awaiting more news.
 
Edwin
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Roy Richter /  Re: Heavy Water
     
Originally-From: roy@rphroy.UUCP (Roy Richter)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Heavy Water
Date: 6 Apr 89 18:45:12 GMT
Organization: GM Research Labs, Warren, MI

In article <2206@laidbak.UUCP> rayd@laidbak.UUCP (Ray Dueland) writes:
>How is deuterium obtained from water?  I would imagine some type of
>column chromatography, but I'm only guessing.  Does water have to be
>broken down in to hydrogen (deuterium) and oxygen first?
>
You get deuterium from water by electrolysis.  You use an electrochemical
cell to separate water into H (or D) and O, but the rate at which the
H and D come off are different, so you can enrich the gas and/or cell
this way.
 
There was another article on Pd being fcc, with a `hole' at the
center of the cell.  These octahedrally-coordinated holes are at the
middle of the edges, too.  That make one octahedral hole per Pd atom.
In addition, there are 2 tetrahedral holes per Pd.  It is in the tetrahedral
holes that the H presumeably accumulates.  Look up any good book
on solid-state physics, like Ashcroft and Mermin, or Kittel.
 
--
Roy Richter                      UUCP:  {sharkey,edsews,mcf}!rphroy!roy
Physics Dept, GM Research        CSNet: rrichter@gmr.com
                                 Internet: roy%rphroy.uucp@mailgw.cc.umich.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Earl Kinmonth /  Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
     
Originally-From: ked@garnet.berkeley.edu (Earl H. Kinmonth)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
Date: 7 Apr 89 05:00:30 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley

In article <17397@cisunx.UUCP> hendrix@unix.cis.pittsburgh.edu (Jon Anderson) writes:
>In article <13896@sequent.UUCP> brian@crg1.UUCP (Brian Godfrey) writes:
>>
>>   International trade is a very powerful force for peace. International
 
As I would write on a student paper, "EVIDENCE?????"
 
>>isolationism is a very powerful force for war. I would be very concerned
 
Again, as I would write on a student paper, "EVIDENCE?????, LOGIC?????"
 
>energy, they are still EXTREMELY dependent on foreign raw materials and
 
Compared to which countries?  How independent are Spain and Italy?  What
does the UK have other than oil and coal?  How important are politically
sensitive (one volatile source) imports in Japan's current product mix?
In supporting its current economic standard?
 
Do countries like the USSR that have natural resources up the kazoo
automatically do better than those that do not?  Before the discovery of
North Sea oil, was Norway twisting in the wind?  What raw materials does
Switzerland have other than a disciplined and skilled work force?
 
How independent is the US?  I think a good case can be made that on many
points the US economy and life style is more dependent on crude raw
material imports.  For argument, imagine a four-fold increase in petrol
prices.  Guess which economy will suffer more:  Imagine that gas cost
$4.00 per gallon in LA tomorrow, $12.00 per gallon in Kobe.  Who do you
think will suffer more, Japanese or Americans?
 
>foreign markets to trade in.  I don't predict any problems.  The
>Japanese are not foolish enough to cut off their nose to spite their
>face.
 
As an historian, I guess I feel that the record shows otherwise.  Any
culture, however well things are going for it, will, if given half a
chance, botch things royally.  Look at the US in the 1960s if you want
a close-to-home example.
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Scot Wilcoxon /  Re: Fusion news from misc.headlines
     
Originally-From: sewilco@datapg.MN.ORG (Scot E Wilcoxon)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fusion news from misc.headlines
Date: 7 Apr 89 05:34:08 GMT
Organization: Data Progress, Minneapolis, MN

In article <65426@pyramid.pyramid.com> scott@pyrtech.pyramid.com
(Scott Hazen Mueller) writes:
>Originally-From: blackje@sunspot.steinmetz (Emmett Black)
...
>has *tentatively* [ my emphasis ] confirmed the discovery of room temperature
>fusion by Jones, Palmer, et.al. at Brigham Young.
...
>	"Who knows, maybe Pons and Fleischmann have invented
>	 the worlds most interesting battery"
...
 
(Gee, a neutron-emitting battery :-)
 
Seriously, if P&S have a new battery chemistry mixed in with their
nuclear device that would be great.
 
After all, we'll need very high capacity batteries so we can charge
electric cars with the cheap (BYU or UofU) fusion-derived electricity.
 
Is an MN class "C" license driver's license adequate for operating
an aircar below 3000 feet? :-)
--
Scot E. Wilcoxon  sewilco@DataPg.MN.ORG    {amdahl|hpda}!bungia!datapg!sewilco
Data Progress 	 UNIX masts & rigging  +1 612-825-2607    uunet!datapg!sewilco
	I'm just reversing entropy while waiting for the Big Crunch.
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------------------------------
1989.04.05 / Joel Upchurch /  Re: The deal
     
Originally-From: joel@peora.ccur.com (Joel Upchurch)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: The deal
Date: 5 Apr 89 20:11:13 GMT
Organization: Concurrent Computer Corp, Orlando FL

In article <16664@cup.portal.com>, RCH@cup.portal.com (Ric C Helton) writes:
> Aside from a quick blurb on CNN, I have not heard *anything* wrt cold
> fusion in any other media, news channel or "real world" discussion.
> Is this thing being covered at all by the general media?
 
The Wall Street Journal had a fairly long article on it in Monday's
paper. I was rather intrigued to a couple of references that were
made to copies of the paper on the cold fusion experiment being faxed
all over the world in a matter of hours. It seems to me that fax
machines may cause a fundemental change in the way that scientific
information is spread. Current computer networks have the limitation
that the person you want to send to may not be on the same net, or the
information may not be in machine readable form. But with fax machines,
you can send to practically anybody in a matter of minutes.
--
Joel Upchurch/Concurrent Computer Corp/2486 Sand Lake Rd/Orlando, FL 32809
joel@peora.ccur.com {uiucuxc,hoptoad,petsd,ucf-cs}!peora!joel
Telephone: (407) 850-1040   Fax: (407) 857-0713
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Jon Singer /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 7 Apr 89 06:43:45 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA

In article <1877@csuna.csun.edu> abcscagz@csuna.csun.edu (Jeff Boeing) writes:
>In article <1989Apr2.145310.29132@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester.
du (Paul Dietz) writes:
>>
>>  Solid state fusion is immoral because...
>>
>>  a. Palladium comes from S. Africa.
>
>It also comes from RUSSIA, which is even worse!   :-)
 
Ah, gently gently. Even as a joke, this is treading on uneasy ground.
Seem like we are only just becoming able to coexist with the Soviet
Union, and like they are beginning to change some policies that we
have found antithetical. I would like to think that we eventually
reach the point at which, when someone comes in from 'way out there
and says, "One planet, one vote!", we can handle it without TOO
awful much squabbling.
 
Cheers!
jon
 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jon Singer is (please don't	|
fill in the blank, I got me	|	Have you transcended dichotomy?
enough troubles awreddy)	|	Well, I'm of two minds about that...
jon@Apple.COM			|
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 /  liz /  Coverage of it all (Was Re: The deal)
     
Originally-From: sommers@pilot.njin.net (liz)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Coverage of it all (Was Re: The deal)
Date: 7 Apr 89 06:36:34 GMT
Organization: The NJ Home for Perverted Hackers

Pons was on Science Journal tonight.  I have no idea what time this
normally shows, as I get it off the PBS feed on my satelitte dish.  They
gave him about 20 minutes (I missed half of it).  The panel seemed to be
skeptical about it all.
 
Last week a MIT professor barely missed calling Pons a liar on the same
show.
--
lizzy
sommers@njin.pilot.net
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Jon Singer /  Re: Cold fusion: our story so far...
     
Originally-From: jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion: our story so far...
Date: 7 Apr 89 07:39:25 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA

In recent postings to this group, Mike Taylor and Jef Poskanzer say
that the Jones and Palmer people got neutron counts about the same as
the ones recorded by the Pons and Fleischman group. (Actually, Taylor
merely says the two are "in agreement on the neutron production" - I
take that to be almost but not quite the same thing.)
 
This is, in fact, not at all the case. Page 6 of the first Jones
group paper lists the observed fusion rate for their run 6 as
"R = (4.1 +- 0.8) x 10^ -3 fusions/s", which is SIX ORDERS OF
MAGNITUDE DOWN from the Pons and Fleischman work. In corroboration
with this, they list their background count as "approximately
10^ -3 s^ -1" in the appropriate energy range, on page 3, and state
that their best result is approximately 5 standard deviations above the
background, on page 4.
 
Figure 4 in the hardcopy shows Foreground-to-Background Ratios, and the
largest value of the tallest error bar is just in excess of 4.0, for
run 9. In fact, run 7 has an error bar that extends below 1.0, and run
1 is just barely above 1.0.
 
Figure 2 in the hardcopy shows total counts, and the scale ends
at 10^2, with the largest value just above the top of the scale.
 
Oh, well. I would have hoped that the results would overlap, myself,
but it doesn't look that way to me, though I could conceivably be
misreading. Somehow, though, I doubt it. Please remember that the BYU
experiments were done from a standing start, and none of them seem to
have been run longer than 20 hours; the UU experiments were charged up
for up to weeks or months before they 'ran'. Very different!
 
Jef mentions that the D-T reaction "should run about 10^4 times
faster" - I thought it was about 10 times, but I'm certainly no
expert on this stuff! If it really is 10^4 times faster, I have
little doubt that someone will build an experiment using DTO
instead of D2O within a remarkably short period of time, and I
expect that they will obtain fairly dramatic results. Even if they
get Jones & Palmer operation, that still gives >1 fusion per second,
rather more than background.  :-)
 
Jef closes by mentioning the heat found by Pons & Fleischman, which
is (depending on which run, I think) between 10^6 and 10^9 times as
much as they can account for by the neutron yield from their
experiment, and says he is still skeptical about it. Me, too. In fact,
I suspect that the people who are claiming that the Pons & Fleischman
work is garbage are doing so more on a basis of that discrepancy than
on the 6 orders of magnitude difference in measured neutron production!
 
Another thing that strikes me as odd is that the BYU group found
neutron production only during about the first 8 hours of several of
their runs, after which the surface of their Palladium, Titanium, or
whatever got coated with garbage from their electrolyte and had to be
scraped or acid-polished to clean it. Pons & Fleischman, on the other
hand, don't see anything at all for many hours, but then they probably
have a less sensitive neutron detector. (The BYU paper does describe
their neutron detection system as "State-of-the-art.") There are, in
any case, significant differences in the experimental setups here! Oh,
yeah: I seem to remember, somewhere in one of the BYU papers, some sort
of statement about the importance of the electrolyte composition; their
electrolyte is quite complicated, having maybe 6 or 7 metal salts in
it; the U of U electrolyte seems to contain 99.5% D2O with 0.1M LiOD in
it, and nothing else except the remaining 0.5% H2O. ...Nothing else
deliberately added, in any case. It almost certainly contains traces of
other stuff. (Unavoidable...)
 
Differences, differences.
 
As to duplication of results, considering the number of hours it
seemed to take P&F to 'charge' their samples, I would be very
surprised if anyone duplicates their results in less than a few weeks.
On the other hand, I am not at all surprised to hear of duplications of
the BYU effort already. You could do it in a 1st year Chemistry course!
Well, you could do it if you had a really great neutron spectrometer.
 
...and that's how it looks from here, 1989 April 06, 11:30PM.
 
				- Jon Singer
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jon Singer is (please don't	|
fill in the blank, I got me	|	Have you transcended dichotomy?
enough troubles awreddy)	|	Well, I'm of two minds about that...
jon@Apple.COM			|
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Jon Singer /  Re: Palladium metallurgy
     
Originally-From: jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Palladium metallurgy
Date: 7 Apr 89 07:55:04 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA

In a recent posting on Palladium metallurgy, Paul Dietz says
 
 >
 >The upshot of this is that hydrogen cycling of palladium creates
 >numerous lattice dislocations as the beta phase nucleates, grows,
 >shrinks and disappears.  Pure palladium cannot be used as a membrane
 >for hydrogen purification for this reason -- it degrades quickly.
 >
 
This looks to me like a great explanation of hydrogen embrittlement
of metals. I would presume that embrittlement is well-understood,
but I've never seen any explanation before. Thanks! Wonder whether
this one holds for lots of metals, or if perhaps there are also
other mechanisms...
 
-jon singer
 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jon Singer is (please don't	|
fill in the blank, I got me	|	Have you transcended dichotomy?
enough troubles awreddy)	|	Well, I'm of two minds about that...
jon@Apple.COM			|
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Michael McClary /  Re: Why is fusion good?
     
Originally-From: michael@xanadu.COM (Michael McClary)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Why is fusion good?
Date: 7 Apr 89 08:34:36 GMT
Organization: Xanadu Operating Company, Palo Alto, CA

In article <1989Apr6.174540.1700@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
>In article <Apr.4.11.55.14.1989.3450@steeleye.rutgers.edu> schaffer@ste
leye.rutgers.edu (Cullen Schaffer) writes:
>>I've always thought that the reason fusion is such a big deal is that
>>it gets us away from dealing with nasty radioactive fuels and waste:
>>hydrogen in, helium out.  But now I think I understand that the
>>high-energy neutron emissions from a fusion reaction create
>>radioactive materials.  Is that true?  Is dealing with fusion waste
>>somehow easier than dealing with fission waste?...
>
>[Stuff about how much less radwaste from plasma-style DD & DT fusion
> than fission of equivalent energy production]
>
>It's also relevant that the F&P experiment, if the reports are taken at
>face value, does not generate nearly as many neutrons as it "should".
 
If the F&P claims turn out to be accurate, that last may be the
understatement of the century.  They reported one part in 10**9
of the neutron flux expected from the heat production.  To bring
that into perspective:
 
  > If you built such a fusion plant for EVERY FAMILY ON THE PLANET, <
  > they would produce as much radwaste as ONE plasma fusion plant   <
  > of equivalent capactiy.                                          <
 
(One for EVERY PERSON should produce less radjunk than ONE equivalent
fission plant.  Anyone care to estimate how long it would take to catch
up to Cernobyl if you just dumped the radwaste?  Maybe we do get to put
it in a car.)
 
-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
Disclaimer: Above assumes F&P are right, makes sweeping assumptions
about enigneering practicality, and takes the 10**9 number as gospel,
not an off-the-cuff estimate.  (Just think, it might be only one for
every HUNDRED people versus one.  B-) )
 
It also assumes things won't get better once we understand what's going
on.  (Fusion campstoves to protect the environment?)
-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / David Preisler /  re: fusion- synthesize petroleum
     
Originally-From: dwp@mtune.ATT.COM (David Preisler)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: re: fusion- synthesize petroleum
Date: 7 Apr 89 02:02:37 GMT
Organization: AT&T ISL Middletown NJ USA

 
Fusion [ or any cheap inexhaustable power supply ] does not mean the end of
petrol products, but it does mean the end of *imported* petrol.
 
All we need to do is extract H from water [ using our cheap inexhaustable
power supply ], and then  synthesize it into anything we need: methane,
octane, plastics, house paint, or whatever.
 
 
 
David William Preisler
  System Administrator
 
AT&T Bell Laboratories     Email: att!mtune!dwp.ATT.COM
     200 Laurel Avenue
Middletown,  NJ  07748     Phone: (201) 957-2594
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / David Bell /  Re: Cold fusion as a terrorist weapon?
     
Originally-From: dbell@cup.portal.com (David J Bell)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a terrorist weapon?
Date: 6 Apr 89 19:32:44 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

>mattb@microsoft.UUCP (Matt Bamberger)
>> Put LSD in the water supply.
>
>LSD breaks down in sunlight.  Sorry to ruin your and Timothy Leary's day.
>
>
>Jonathan A. Chandross
 
 
So introduce it *after* pumping out of the reservoir... Pumping/treatment
stations aren't very well protected!
 
Dave       dbell@cup.portal.com
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 /  James_J_Kowalc /  Re: The deal
     
Originally-From: James_J_Kowalczyk@cup.portal.com
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: The deal
Date: 7 Apr 89 09:36:02 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

In article <16664@cup.portal.com> RCH@cup.portal.com (Ric C Helton) writes:
<Aside from a quick blurb on CNN, I have not heard *anything* wrt cold
<fusion in any other media, news channel or "real world" discussion.
<Is this thing being covered at all by the general media?  CNN's announcer
<gave the impression by his attitude, that this was another "Yawn,
<perpetual motion hoax" type affair.....  Even so, you'd think the papers
<would have *something* about it.
 
There have been stories daily in both of the major Salt Lake City, Utah,
newspapers (usually on the front page) since the initial announcement on
March 23, 1989.  Of course, being close to the source does tend to make
things a bit more "newsworthy."  The added intrigue of "BYU vs U of U" has
also been the source of quite a few articles. :-)
 
Jim Kowalczyk
 Kowalczyk@chemistry.utah.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Tim Maroney /  Re: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
     
Originally-From: tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: misc.legal,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
Date: 7 Apr 89 11:20:41 GMT
Organization: Eclectic Software, San Francisco

In article <1694@thor.acc.stolaf.edu> larsonjs@thor.stolaf.edu (James S.
Larson @ St. Olaf College) writes:
[If cold fusion works:]
>What could the oil companies do?  For instance they could buy the patents to
>the new devices and then keep them hidden, like they did to methane and
>hydrogen powered cars.
 
In article <4645@pt.cs.cmu.edu> ralphw@ius3.ius.cs.cmu.edu (Ralph Hyre) writes:
>You can only hide something in this way for the life of the patent, right?
>(17 years in the U.S.)
 
Not even that long.  All patents are public.  Anyone can buy a copy for
a dollar.  You can't hide something that's patented, period.  You can
suppress development by refusing to license the patent or market the
invention yourself, but it would be perfectly clear to everyone who
keeps up with patents what you are doing.  No such cases have ever been
proven, so far as I know.  If they were, there would be a great outcry,
and Congress would most likely revise patent law to prevent the use of
patents for suppression of inventions.
 
Now trade secret protection, that could be used.  A company could buy
the details of a trade secret process and then sit on the process
forever, as long as the inventor was willing to abide by the terms of
the contract requiring continued secrecy.  I don't know that this has
ever been proven to happen either, but it's considerably more plausible.
--
Tim Maroney, Consultant, Eclectic Software, sun!hoptoad!tim
"Philosophy is the talk on a cereal box
 Religion is the smile on a dog" -- Edie Brickell, "What I Am"
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Pat-bob White /  Re: Heavy Water
     
Originally-From: ain@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Pat-bob White)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Heavy Water
Date: 7 Apr 89 14:45:22 GMT
Organization: PUCC Land, USA

In article <2206@laidbak.UUCP> rayd@laidbak.UUCP (Ray Dueland) writes:
>How is deuterium obtained from water?  I would imagine some type of
>column chromatography, but I'm only guessing.  Does water have to be
>broken down in to hydrogen (deuterium) and oxygen first?
 
   From what I recall of my chemistry days, D2O boils at about .1 deg C higher
than H2O.. if this number is correct, separation could be as simple as
distillation.
   Anyone have a CRC they can check this with?  (I'm not a chemist anymore, so
I don't have one :(
 
 
thanks,
Pat White
ARPA/UUCP: k.cc.purdue.edu!ain  BITNET: PATWHITE@PURCCVM  PHONE: (317) 743-8421
U.S.  Mail:  320 Brown St. apt. 406,    West Lafayette, IN 47906
Life's a joke.. so laugh at it :-)
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Yosi Hoshen /  Re: cold fusion, control experiment
     
Originally-From: jho@ihlpe.ATT.COM (Yosi Hoshen)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: cold fusion, control experiment
Date: 7 Apr 89 12:53:13 GMT
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories - Naperville, Illinois

> ".... B. Stanley Pons said Wednesday he has tried his experiment with ordinary
> water and it produced no significant heat, which could be evidence that the
> heating process (seen with D2O) is indeed nuclear and not chemical.
 
Given that H2O did not produce significant heat.  There is another
question.  Was Pons able to balance the energies in his experiments
for H2O.  If he was able to show that the first law of thermodynamics
holds for H2O that means that he was able to debug his calorimetric
set up.  That would be a signficant step.
 
> Given that deuterium is twice as heavy as ordinary hydrogen it doesn't
> seem inconceivable to me that its weight could affect its chemistry
> (e.g. its behavior when dissolved in pd).  Any chemists out there willing
> to comment?
 
I would suspect that there would be significant difference in the
rate of reactions (espescially diffusion controlled reactions)
because of the dependency of diffusion on mass.  On the other
hand, the energetics should  not differ significantly.  Also
equilibrium parameters should be very similar.  Under this
assumption, Pons experiments could run faster for H2O.  And
any peculiar behaviour should be seen for H2O before they
would be seen for D2O.  Does anyone have a more precise info
on this issue?
 
Yosi Hoshen
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / John Nagle /  Room Temperature fusion - latest press reports
     
Originally-From: jbn@glacier.STANFORD.EDU (John B. Nagle)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.research,alt.fusion
Subject: Room Temperature fusion - latest press reports
Date: 7 Apr 89 16:29:07 GMT
Organization: Stanford University

 
     Summary of latest press reports.  No new hard data.
 
NATURE, 30 MAR 89
 
      No technical data, but some editorializing about premature publication.
Nature announced that they have not accepted any papers on the subject at this
time.  They do not say if any are out undergoing peer review, in accordance
with their usual policy.
 
WALL STREET JOURNAL, 7 APR 89
 
     "Fusion Findings in Utah May Take Months to Verify", by Bishop and Stipp,
reports the frustrations of researchers trying to duplicate the Utah result.
Pons et al. didn't, for example, tell whether their apparatus was sealed from
outside air, which might be important but no one is sure.  There is grousing
that Pons didn't do a control experiment with plain water, which would settle
whether this is a chemical or nuclear phenomenon.  WSJ says flatly that there
are not even rumors of duplication of the Utah result at this point.
 
WALL STREET JOURNAL, 7 APR 89
 
     "Fusion Confusion may lead to Pall over Palladium", by Valentine, notes
that volume in palladium futures is up 500% over March 20 levels, the price
has gone from about $145 to $170 per troy ounce.  Current production of
palladium is about 2.5 million ounces in the USSR, 1.1 million in South
Africa, and there is a new mine in Stillwater, Montana starting up this year.
Recycling yields about 0.45 million ounces a year.  But the speculative
interest seems to be cooling off.
 
					John Nagle
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Stuart Warmink /  Re: nuclear aircraft
     
Originally-From: sw@cbnewsl.ATT.COM (Stuart Warmink)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: nuclear aircraft
Date: 7 Apr 89 14:07:33 GMT
Organization: Interface Systems at AT&T Bell Laboratories

In article <1989Apr6.175353.1984@utzoo.uucp>, henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
> There was an experimental B-36 that flew with an operating reactor aboard,
> although the reactor was purely a test device and did not power the aircraft.
> Considerable precautions were taken against the possibility of a crash.
 
Err...you mean, err, like temporarily suspend the force of gravity?  %-)
--
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Captain, I see no reason to stand here  |  Stuart Warmink, Whippany, NJ, USA
 and be insulted" - Spock                | sw@cbnewsl.ATT.COM (att!cbnewsl!sw)
 ------------------------> My opinions are just that <------------------------
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Kenneth Clubok /  Magnetic Pd?
     
Originally-From: clubok@husc4.HARVARD.EDU (Kenneth Clubok)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Magnetic Pd?
Date: 7 Apr 89 16:27:23 GMT
Organization: Harvard University Science Center, Cambridge MA

 
     One or two people have suggested that the structure of the Pd lattice
somehow makes the D electron spins align, therefore causing a preference
for the D+D->T+p reaction.  Now correct me if I'm wrong, (and I'm sure that
several people will), but it seems to me that if the electron spins are
aligning, then the Pd+D complex would be ferromagnetic.  Of course, this
would be easy enough to test.  So, am I completely confused, or what?
 
Kenneth Clubok
Harvard University
clubok@husc4.bitnet
 
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Dave Mack /  Re: Cold fusion: our story so far...
     
Originally-From: mack@inco.UUCP (Dave Mack)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion: our story so far...
Date: 7 Apr 89 14:46:53 GMT
Organization: McDonnell Douglas-INCO, McLean, VA

In article <28535@apple.Apple.COM> jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer) writes:
>Oh, well. I would have hoped that the results would overlap, myself,
>but it doesn't look that way to me, though I could conceivably be
>misreading. Somehow, though, I doubt it. Please remember that the BYU
>experiments were done from a standing start, and none of them seem to
>have been run longer than 20 hours; the UU experiments were charged up
>for up to weeks or months before they 'ran'. Very different!
 
Which suggests that Jones et al may have been seeing fusion occurring
only on or near the surface of the electrode, while P-F were seeing
it throughout the bulk of the electrode, particularly since Jones
reported that the iron deposition on the Pd electrode quenched the
reaction after about eight hours. P-F may have made a much more
intelligent choice of electrolyte. I would love to know how the
Jones group came up with that electrolyte mix.
 
It would be interesting if the BYU group repeated their experiment
using the UU electrolyte and chargeup procedure. At least we'd
get a believable check on the UU neutron flux reports.
 
Does anyone out there know the diffusion rate of d+ in solution
into Pd and Ti?
 
--
Dave Mack
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Erik TDB /  Media cover of cold fusion (was Re: The deal)
     
Originally-From: eao@umecs.cs.umu.se (Erik Marklund TDB)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Media cover of cold fusion (was Re: The deal)
Date: 7 Apr 89 15:26:08 GMT
Organization: Dep. of Inform.Proc.,University of Umea,Sweden

In article <16807@cup.portal.com> James_J_Kowalczyk@cup.portal.com writes:
>There have been stories daily in both of the major Salt Lake City, Utah,
>newspapers (usually on the front page) since the initial announcement
The swedish media has followed the events rather good, and last night on
the TV-news they reported something interesting:
 
	A swedish engineer patended a method for producing helium from
	hydrogen with Palladium back in 1926 (nineteenhundredtwentiesix).
 
What a coincidence!
--
Erik Marklund			eao@cs.umu.se			+90 - 16 63 30
  **  The opinions above are formed by society, IMHO.  **
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------------------------------
1989.04.06 / Chris Langford /  Re: Cold fusion as a terrorist weapon?
     
Originally-From: langford@reed.UUCP (Chris Langford)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a terrorist weapon?
Date: 6 Apr 89 15:59:14 GMT
Organization: Eric & Jackie's Billiard Parlor

In article <Apr.3.21.53.28.1989.27213@paul.rutgers.edu> jac@paul.rutgers
edu (J. A. Chandross) writes:
>mattb@microsoft.UUCP (Matt Bamberger)
>> Put LSD in the water supply.
>
>LSD breaks down in sunlight.  Sorry to ruin your and Timothy Leary's day.
>
 
Not if you add enough citric acid (absorbs at the same wavelength as
LSD), or so I've been told.
 
--
Chris Langford  {backbone}!tektronix!reed!langford -or- langford@reed.bitnet
"As an adolescent I aspired to lasting fame, I craved factual certainty, and
I thirsted for a meaningful vision of human life -- so I became a scientist.
This is like becoming an archbishop so you can meet girls." -Matt Cartmill-
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Paul Dietz /  Some proposals for fusion experiments
     
Originally-From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Some proposals for fusion experiments
Date: 7 Apr 89 18:05:56 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

Some observations about cold fusion experiments...
 
It would be useful to get a measurement of the total energy stored in
a Pd electrode during the charging-up period.  So, how about charging
up an electrode, removing it from the apparatus, and putting it into a
bomb-type calorimeter (with enough oxygen to burn the deuterium)?
 
Once the deuterium is in the electrode, is it still necessary to do
electrolysis?  I have read that the surface of Pd electrodes can be
poisoned with xylene.  Density gradients due to electromigration
of deuterons might be maintained by passing a current directly through
the Pd from an auxiliary contact with a positive potential.
 
I believe the mobility of deuterium (and hydrogen) in Pd increases
markedly with temperature -- the activation energy of the traps is
estimated to be around .23 eV, if I understand it correctly; if so,
raising the temperature could increase the diffusion rate by a factor
of 100.  It would be useful to precharge an electrode with high P/T
gaseous deuterium and/or do some of the electrolysis under pressure to
raise the boiling point of D2O.
 
Finally, I think thermally activated diffusion of D can be stopped by
cooling the electrode to cryogenic temperatures.  If the putative
fusion activity depends on the current only to maintain the deuterium
density, it would be interesting to disconnect a charged electrode and
plop it into liquid nitrogen and see if it makes heat and radiation.
Calorimetry should be easier at low temperatures with no external
energy sources.
 
	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Jerry Aguirre /  Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
     
Originally-From: jerry@olivey.olivetti.com (Jerry Aguirre)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
Date: 7 Apr 89 18:34:56 GMT
Organization: Olivetti ATC; Cupertino, Ca

In article <1134@rpi.edu> ncc1701@pawl.rpi.edu (Mark O. Chadwick) writes:
> I seem to recall something about a bomber being flown in the late 40's or
> early 50's that used NUCLEAR power.  It's a good thing that didn't crash,
> or a mess would certainly have been generated!
 
Yes, it would be terrible.  Even worse, imagine if they carried nuclear
BOMBS in airplanes and one of those crashed.  Just think about one or
more bombs spread out over several square miles! :-)
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Herb Lison /  Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
     
Originally-From: hlison@bbn.com (Herb Lison)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
Date: 7 Apr 89 17:44:07 GMT
Organization: BBN Laboratories Incorporated, Cambridge, MA

In article <13896@sequent.UUCP> brian@crg1.UUCP (Brian Godfrey) writes:
>   International trade is a very powerful force for peace. International
>isolationism is a very powerful force for war. I would be very concerned
>about any situation which allowed a country to isolate itself from the
>world.
 
The first statement puzzles me because it doesn't seem consistent with
historical facts.  Japan had no foreign wars for the 250+ year period
when the country was effectively closed off to the outside world, and
trade was limited to a small number of ships each year received at
Nagasaki.  Isolationist countries may have other problems, but I
don't think an exaggerated propensity for aggression is one of them.
 
Herb Lison
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Ramsey Haddad /  Re: Cold fusion: our story so far...
     
Originally-From: ramsey@polya.Stanford.EDU (Ramsey W. Haddad)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion: our story so far...
Date: 7 Apr 89 18:35:09 GMT
Organization: Computer Science Department

In article <28535@apple.Apple.COM> jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer) writes:
>Another thing that strikes me as odd is that the BYU group found
>neutron production only during about the first 8 hours of several of
>their runs ...
> Pons & Fleischman, on the other
>hand, don't see anything at all for many hours, but then they probably
>have a less sensitive neutron detector. (The BYU paper does describe
>their neutron detection system as "State-of-the-art.")
 
The way I heard it was:
 Pons & Fleischman did some early experiments and got lots of heat.
They decided that they should check for neutrons, so they borrowed a
neutron detector ... from BYU.
 
 That's how the two groups found put about each other and agreed to
simultaneous publication in Nature.
--
Ramsey W Haddad
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Steve Masticola /  Re: Room Temperature fusion - latest press reports
     
Originally-From: masticol@paul.rutgers.edu (Steve Masticola)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion - latest press reports
Date: 7 Apr 89 18:58:46 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.

NPR "Morning Edition" also had a 5-minute report on a related topic:
The Utah state legislature was called back from recess today for a
one-day session. Topic: How to make sure Utah gets its fair share from
fusion development.
 
One Utah legislator was quoted as saying that some of the "major
industrial companies of the world were very interested in fusion", and
thatpresent research lead times of "weeks or months" should be
exploited to keep BYU and UU ahead of out-of-state concerns.
 
The report commented on "great skepticism" among the scientific
community about the F-P findings, and said that the experiment had
been neither formally published nor duplicated.
 
Disclaimer: I didn't report the news, I just reported the report (from
a memory without error correction :-)
 
- Steve.
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / F Salustri /  Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
     
Originally-From: fil@me.utoronto.ca (Filippo Salustri)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
Date: 7 Apr 89 17:32:02 GMT
Organization: U of T Mechanical Engineering

In article <1586@attdso.att.com> tim@attdso.att.com (Tim J Ihde) writes:
>In article <Mar.29.01.31.38.1989.26758@caip.rutgers.edu> giraldi@caip.r
tgers.edu (John Giraldi) writes:
>[...]
>Seeing as that at this time he must have been talking about fission power,
>I'm glad they never whent through with this plan.  Even those who accept
>fission reactors as relativly safe should have problems with a fission
>powered airplane.  A nuclear sub would just sink (bad enough), but can you
>imagine a fission reactor in a plane strewn over several miles when the
>thing crashes?  A plane crash is much more likely than a meltdown . . .
 
	There *was* a fission powered experimental plane.  Forget the name;
it was an X-something.  I think it was a converted B29.  Had the reactor
tucked into the back end of the tail.  Their major trouble was that they
couldn't find a way to get enough power out of it and to the props (the test
flights always had the reactor running, but unhooked from the propulsion
system.  Eventually, of course, the project was scrapped.
 
Fil Salustri
fil@me.utoronto.ca
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Dave Mack /  Re: Media cover of cold fusion (was Re: The deal)
     
Originally-From: mack@inco.UUCP (Dave Mack)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Media cover of cold fusion (was Re: The deal)
Date: 7 Apr 89 19:38:19 GMT
Organization: McDonnell Douglas-INCO, McLean, VA

In article <833@umecs.cs.umu.se> eao@umecs.cs.umu.se (Erik Marklund TDB) writes:
>The swedish media has followed the events rather good, and last night on
>the TV-news they reported something interesting:
>
>	A swedish engineer patended a method for producing helium from
>	hydrogen with Palladium back in 1926 (nineteenhundredtwentiesix).
 
???
It would, I think, be rather interesting to look at this patent if it
actually exists. Pd is currently used to purify hydrogen, and might
be used to separate hydrogen and helium, but *producing* helium from
hydrogen? Did they even know how to separate deuterium from protium
in 1926? Or did some Swedish engineer develop a fusion reactor using
ordinary hydrogen sixty-odd years ago?
 
This is whole business is getting amazingly weird.
 
--
Dave Mack
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Jon Singer /  A report from the CERN talk by Fleischman, by Douglas Morrison
     
Originally-From: jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: A report from the CERN talk by Fleischman, by Douglas Morrison
Date: 7 Apr 89 22:31:39 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc., Cupertino, CA

 
 
Here's an interesting item I just got from Bill Higgins -
 
Date:     Fri, 7 Apr 89 09:59 CDT
Originally-From: <HIGGINS@FNALB.BITNET>
Subject:  Morrison account of CERN seminar
 
	<<intermediate steps removed for brevity>>
 
Date: Sun, 2 Apr 89 18:05 GMT +0100
Originally-From: MORRISON%VXPRIX.decnet.cern@cernvax
To: hiphy000%tufts@TUFTS.BITNET
X-Vms-To: MINT::"hiphy000@tufts"
 
 
 
                                                           31 March 1989.
              PHYSICS NEWS - COLD FUSION?
 
Dear E632 and WA84 Colleagues,
 
  There have been many reports in the newspapers that Prof.
Fleischmann of Southampton and Dr. Pons of Utah have evidence for cold
fusion of deuterium by electrochemistry. This afternoon Prof.
Fleischmann gave a seminar in CERN. Because of the many media reports,
the auditorium was crowded and although I arrived 20 minutes early, I
had to sit on the steps. As I have given several lectures on Wrong
Results in Physics, I went to this and also to the press conference
afterwards - especially as the news reports had been very hard to
understand scientifically, but if true, this could have a major impact
on the world economy.
 
  Martin Fleischmann had a reputation as a major expert in his
subject. As his talk developed, it became clear that he was a first
class scientist and it seems to me that he has made a major
breakthrough, though what the fundamentals processes are is not yet
fully understood.
 
  Let me try and explain what I think I learnt (I talked to him for a
while afterwards, so it may not be too bad).
 
  Basically the catalyst used, palladium Pd, is a face-centred
crystal. It can absorb a certain amount of hydrogen. If an electrical
potential is applied, then over a period of time it can absorb a great
deal. For F & P, they reached 0.6 atoms of deuterium per atom of
Palladium after three months.
 
    They made tests with four rods each of 10 cm length and of
diameters 0.1, 0.2, 0.4 and 0.8 cm. They only have good measurements
for the first three as one morning when they came in they found that
the fourth and largest rod had melted and the fume cupboard was
starting to smoulder!  They made calorimetric measurements and found
that they were getting more heat out than they had put in and this
effect increased with the diameter of the rod. It seems to be a volume
effect and not a surface effect. The excess heat is about 5 megajoules
per cm3 which is about 100 times greater than any known chemical
process.
 
  A second measurement was by putting a NaI crystal close when they
recorded gammas. The energy spectrum of the gammas was sharply peaked
between 2000 and 2400 which is characteristic of the (n,gamma)
reaction on hydrogen. This could be explained as the neutrons
interacting in the water bath round the experiment.
 
  Thirdly they observed tritium production and measured and found a
"characteristic" spectrum (I did not understand this fully, partly as
he had an incomplete scale on the graph, but see later).
 
 Fourthly they looked for neutrons using a polythene sphere filled
with BF3.  The count was three times background. In 50 hours they
counted 40,000 neutrons.  However there is a point that is a stumbling
block for particle physicists - if you take the rate of release of
heat, then there should be 10 E 13 or 14 neutrons - a huge
discrepancy. He does not have the equipment to measure the neutron
spectrum - the neutrons have to pass through the surrounding water
bath which tends to thermalise them.
 
  A conclusion that can be drawn from Fleischmann's talk is that the
heating is not due to the reactions
 
              2D + 2D  ---> 3He + n                               (1)
  or          2D + 3T  ---> 4He + n                               (2)
 
which are the ones that spring to mind.
 
 He gave a table of the excess enthalpy in the Pd rod cathodes
expressed as a percentage of breakeven values;
 
                0.1 mm   81%
                0.2     189%
                0.4     839%
 
>From this it can be judged that it was not too surprising that the 0.8 cm
rod melted!
 
  He opened his talk with a basic discussion of electrochemistry.
 
            D2O + e-   <--->  D(absorber) + OD-
 
           D(absorber)  <--->  D(lattice)
 
      D(absorber) + D2O + e-  <--->  D2 + OD-
 
  With the applied field the D can go over the potential barrier by
applying a Potl. Difference at the interface. The result is that
inside the Pd there can be many collisions without repulsion.
Effectively there is a PD of 0.8 eV which can translate into a
compression of 10 E 27 atmos. i.e. it would require this enormous
pressure to achieve the same PD. Thus electrochemistry is high energy
chemistry! The D is in a sea of high electron density. The structural
or coherent strength of the Pd is 4000 atm. Thus it is a very strange
kind of Quantum Mechanics (his phrase).
 
  I have to go to collect my daughter at the airport, but will try and
continue later.
 
                                                            1 April 1989.
                                             (despite the date, it is serious!)
 
  Re-reading what I wrote yesterday. I realise that I have been trying
to explain simply. The actual talk contained some more details and two
tables of results that I had only time to copy down partially. There
was a fuller discussion of electrochemistry.
 
  The question now is what is happening. The observations are of a
source of heat, of emision of tritium, gammas and of neutrons, but the
number of neutrons are many orders of magnitude less than would be
expected if the heat produced came from reactions producing neutrons.
Fleischmann talks as if you have to modify quantum mechanics - this I
do not believe - we have to apply it differently.
 
  An additional piece of information that he gave at his press
conference but not at his seminar, was that the particle emission was
not uniform but had fluctuations which were much larger than
statistical - this I think is a very important piece of information.
 
  There are a lot of different theories being discussed. The following
comments should be considered private, qualitative and not necessarily
correct.
 
		[PRIVATE COMMENTS DELETED HERE]...
 
  In answer to a question, Fleischmann said that they had tried to
look at 3He and 4He production and ratio, but the experiment is
difficult for them and they prefer to leave that for experts who have
the equipment - for they have been using their own money for 5 years.
 
  Looking again at my notes, I discover that John Ellis had said in
the discussion that there could be little Coulomb repulsion as there
could be a classical oscillation of the lattice.
 
  Before the Seminar, things were rather disturbed with the media -
lots of TV crews and flashes popping off. The Chairman, Carlo, asked
them all to leave explaining this was a scientific meeting and he did
not want questions on any other subject, but afterwards there would be
a press conference. After some time the media left. At the end of
Fleischmann's talk, the TV crews re-entered and had to be requested to
leave again before the question period.
 
  On the way to the press conference, Fleischmann was told that there
had been a report on the radio that a group (at Columbia?) had
confirmed his result. He said he had not heard this and during the
Press Conference he continued to emphasise, in a very proper manner,
that before leaping to conclusions, there should be further confirming
evidence.
 
  Fleischmann had described his other press conference in Utah as
awful, but this one went well with Carlo a good Chairman - who was
also asked questions. Fleischmann explained that the work was
intentional and not an accident. He said that after verification, it
might take 10 to 20 years to develop an economically viable system.
Carlo was asked his opinion and said that "Dr. Fleischmann has planted
a seed - will the seed grow up? I think yes" Fleischmann said that he
believed in Karl Popper's philosophy - you cannot prove something
right, you can only prove it wrong. "We have spent 5 years trying to
prove ourselves wrong, now other people should try".
 
  In explaining why they did it, "it was not to do an ego trip (though
all scientists are on an ego trip to some extent), but to try and find
a plentiful source of energy. We have a social conscience"
 
  Question - "There was a sceptical atmosphere in the room, did you
feel like a chemistry bull in an arena of physics toreadors?"
 
  Answer - "Are people correct to be sceptical?, yes, it is correct to
be sceptical. But it was not a bad atmosphere. Our experiment fits
partly into accepted ideas but not entirely, therefore either
experiment is wrong or we have extended the conceptions of possible
fusion mechanisms".
 
  Carlo was asked if he found the meeting strange - "No, I am at home
in my own lab".
 
  Question - "Do you think it is correct?". Answer(MF) - "I think it
is correct, but others should show it is correct". (Note, this was
typical of some of the questions where the journalist asked "for a
good quote").
 
  Carlo was asked if CERN should work on fusion. He replied " There
are different science cultures. In an orchestra everyone tries to play
his own instrument, and does not have other instruments. But we have
quantum mechanics in common. We should do what we do best. But there
is also cross-fertilisation between chemistry and nuclear physics" He
also joked that this was the first time that a chemist had discovered
a neutron!
 
  Question - "Any military applications?"
 
  Answer(MF) - "There will always be some military application of
anything, but we do not know of any such thing"
 
  Question - " You said you did not have enough money, have you been
offered money since your press conference last week"?
 
  Answer - "Up to now have used our own money as we thought it
unlikely to work, so there were some restrictions. Since then we have
been approached with offers but as our capacity to spend money is
limited, we have to plan carefully.
 
  Question - "If it is fusion what will its effect be on other fusion
research?"
 
  Answer - " Glad you asked that. It would be a total disaster to cut
back on other fusion research. Ours is small scale, theirs is large
scale generation of electricity. It would be extremely foolish to cut
back".
 
  There was more, but I hope this gives the flavour - both Fleischmann
and Carlo aquitted themselves very well and responsibly.
 
  Friedrich Dydak had told me he had two papers confirming the F & P
work and I could copy them. Later when I was returning them,
Fleischmann came in for another TV interview and we talked while he
was waiting for the lighting to be set up. He had not seen the papers,
so I gave him copies. The main author was Stephen Jones who is at the
BYU in Utah beside Dr. Pons. We looked quickly at the papers - he was
particularly interested in the dates on the papers.  I explained I was
interested particularly for two reasons. Firstly as I was possibly the
first to observe fusion in Europe - in the early sixties I was
scanning bubble chamber film of deuterium and normally when there is
the decay chain,
 
      pion   --->  muon  --->  electron
 
the muon always has the same short range (if the pion is at rest). But
one day I observed an extra long range for the muon. I spent some time
measuring the curvature and angles of the tracks, but could not
explain it. However someone told me that the Berkeley bubble chamber
group had found it and it had been explained as the muon replacing an
electron and causing fusion. At this Luis insisted that this should be
treated as a secret, but quickly it was calculated that it had no
military or economical value. So I left it and went on to new
things(incidently the Scientific American article of July 1987 by
Rafelski and Jones on Cold Nuclear Fusion says that this muon -induced
fusion was first suggested by Frank and Sakharov in the late 1940's).
 
    Secondly I said I had given several serious lectures on Wrong
Results in Physics and found that they exhibited certain
characteristics so that they could be recognised before they had been
proved wrong - after the press reports I wondered if this was a case
in point, but after I had heard his conference, I was inclined to
believe that his results were correct. He did not seem to appreciate
this too much, not unnaturally, but we continued talking and he told
me some remarkable things. I mentioned that after the press
conference, Dr. Wind was looking for him as he used to work in Utrecht
on electrochemistry and had been able to insert 1000 hydrogen ions per
atom of palladium catalyst. Dr. Fleischmann (who had attained 0.6 ions
after 3 months) said he did not believe this number of 1000. However
talking with Per-Olaf Hulth this morning, he had checked this subject
last night and read that 850 ions of hydrogen had been inserted - this
could be used as hydrogen storage cells for cars driven by hydrogen -
air mixtures. If I remember rightly, Fleischmann had replied that they
had not prepared the surface of their palladium rod, and this could
make a big difference. If it were possible to insert so many deuterium
ions into palladium, then the rate of fusion would be greatly
increased (or the charging time would be less than 3 months).
 
  The two papers are;
 
1. "Observation of Cold Nuclear Fusion in Condensed Matter" by S.E.
Jones and others of Brigham Young Univ. and J. Rafelski of Univ. of
Arizona.
 
2. "Limits on Cold Fusion in Condensed Matter; a Parametric study" by
J. Rafelski and others of Arizona and S.E. Jones of BYU.
 
  The main point of the first paper is that they claim to have
observed neutrons when there was low voltage electrolytic fusion of
deuterons into metallic titanium or palladium. They believe this is
from the reaction;
 
        d + d  --->  3He(0.82 MeV) + n(2.45 MeV)              (1)
 
The distribution of counts in different channels give a broad
enhancement which the authors say corresponds to neutrons of 2.45 MeV.
This looks convincing - just; it would be good to repeat this.
 
  They say they have not yet (?!advertising?) obtained results
regarding the parallel reaction;
 
          d + d  ---> p(3.02 MeV)  +  t(1.01 MeV)                  (3)
 
  The electrolyte contains various minmeral salts and they say that
their evidence indicates the importance of co-deposition of deuterons
and metal ions at the negative electrode. "hydrogen bubbles were
observed to form on the Pd foils only after several minutes of
electrolysis, suggesting the rapid absorbtion of deuterons into the
foil; oxygen bubbles formed at the anode immediately". The palladium
pieces were 0.025cm thick and had the surfaces roughened or were
mossy. They do not say that it took 3 months to get started by
charging the deuterons into the palladium...
 
		[PRIVATE COMMENT DELETED HERE]
 
  The experimental part of their paper gives an impression of haste,
but there are a lot of other interesting things in their paper; In a
deuterium molecule the separation between the deuterons is 0.74 A and
the d-d fusion rate is very slow about 10 E -70 per D2 molecule per
sec ( calculated in an interesting paper by Van Siclen, C.D. and
Jones, S.E., Journal of Physics G Nucl. Phys. 12 (1986) 213 - here
they state that the fusion rates for reactions (1) and (3) are nearly
equal over the range 10 to 30 KeV. They also discuss whether
piezonuclear fusion - i.e. by pressure - within the liquid metallic
hydrogen core of Jupiter could account for the fact that the planet
radiates 1.5 times as much heat as it receives from the sun. However
they concluded that this process was many orders of magnitude too
small to be a significant energy source - this is where the idea of
Fleischmann and Pons of using electrolytic catalysis is so important).
However in muon-induced catalysis the internuclear separation is
reduced by about the ratio of the muon to the electron masses (200)
resulting in the fusion rate increasing by an enormous factor, 80
orders of magnitude!
 
  In the second paper this variation of fusion rate as a function of
the distance is quantified. This made me think of the observation by
Fleischmann that they had observed large fluctuations in the signals -
for the number of deuterons in a space in the lattice of Palladium is
discrete and given by Poisson statistics hence the distance between
the deuterons will vary appreciably - this and other factors(roughness
of surface) could cause there to be local spots hot in space and time,
since the fusion rate varies so violently with distance. In addition
to the reactions (1) and (3), there can occur the reaction on tritium
that will exist to some varable extent,
 
            2D + 3T  --->  4He + n                            (2)
 
Although there is less tritium than deuterium, this reaction has a
much higher cross section - so that this reaction (2) could also help
fluctuations (but these comments on fluctations are my own, so treat
them with appropriate caution).
 
  Paper (1) also has an interesting chapter on Geophysical
considerations (or the Hawaii effect). Sea water contains about one
part in 7000 of deuterium. By subduction water is carried down to the
earth's mantle where it might undergo fusion via the reaction;
 
                 p + d  --->  3He + gamma(5.4 MeV)          (4)
 
under the extreme pressure and temperature there. Calculations are
done which indicate that a substantial contribution to the heat flux
through the crust could come from cold fusion. This heat could also
help to explain the localised heat of volcanism at subduction zones.
They quote that the 3He to 4He ratio is high in rocks, liquids and
gases from volcanoes. Further they then predict that tritium will be
produced from d + d fusion and since tritium is relatively
short-lived(12 years half-life), observation of tritium would suggest
a geologically recent process. On the Mauna Loa mountain on Hawaii,
tritium was monitored from 1971 to 1977 and a correlation is shown in
the paper between the tritium level and volcanic activity. This is
very striking for the 1972 Mauna Ulu eruption but later eruption
signals were partly confused by atomic bomb tests. They estimate that
in the Mauna Ulu eruption 100 curies of tritium was released per day
for 30 days!
 
   In paper (1), it is also reported that after diamonds are sliced
with a laser, the concentration of 4He and 3He has been measured - it
is reported that the 4He is distributed uniformly while the 3He is
concentrated in spots suggesting cold fusion reactions. Similar
anomalies have been reported in metal foils.
 
  The authors also calculate that the excess heat from Jupiter could
be accounted for from cold fusion in the core consisting of metallic
hydrogen plus iron silicate.
 
  The second paper calculates the cold fusion rate of d-d as a
function of 1 - relative energy, 2 - separation of two hydrogen nuclei
in a sphere, 3 - the effective electron mass, 4 - the effective
electron charge. They do not consider the effects of the lattice of a
catalyst as do Fleischmann and Pons.
 
  It is probable that some readers will be thinking that this letter
has wandered off strict physics news. They are right. It is
intentional as I feel this subject will become so important to society
that we must consider the broader implications as well as the
scientific ones. Looking into a cloudy crystal ball, it is not
impossible to foresee the situation that the experiments are so easy
that schools will be doing them, that many new companies will start
up, most(not all) will fail and the present big power companies will
be running down their oil and coal power stations while they are
building deuterium separation plants and new power plants based on
cold fusion. No new nuclear power stations will be built except for
military needs.  There will be very little if any research on high
temperature(plasma) fusion.  Petrol will probably still be used for
cars. Overall pollution will start to be less. Ecologists will be
talking about the contamination from radioactive tritium and asking
about the effect of this tritium on the ozone layer.
 
CONCLUSIONS
 
            It is known(from muon cataysis) that if two nuclei of
deuterium or tritium are held close together, then they can fuse
releasing energy. Fleischmann and Pons thought of achieving this by
using electrolysis to insert deuterium nuclei inside a palladium
catalyst. They observed production of more heat than they put in. They
also observed tritium production, gammas of an energy consistent with
neutrons interacting with the surrounding water bath, and neutrons
directly. They thus conclude they have observed fusion of heavy
hydrogen producing energy, i.e. cold fusion. A paper by Jones et al.
reports on the operation of similar electrolytic cells with
observation of neutrons with an energy spectrum consistent with that
expected from deuterium fusion.  They also describe interesting though
rather anecdotal evidence for fusion in volcanoes, Jupiter, diamonds
and metal foils. The theory, while not fully developed, suggests that
the deuterium nuclei inside the lattice of the catalyst, are held so
closely together that the probability of fusion(the tunneling effect)
is dramatically increased by many orders of magnitude. it may be
expected that this will cause major changes in the energy industry and
major social, economic and hence political changes.
 
 
                                              Douglas R. O. Morrison.
 
====================================================================
Additional notes from poster (Jon Singer) -
 
1) Please note the discrepancy between this report and the published
paper: Morrison says that a 0.8cm diameter rod melted, whereas the
paper does not mention any such rod (unless I misread it) and says
that a 1cm cube was what melted.
 
2) Considering everything, I think that 1.2 hydrogens per lattice
cell is entirely reasonable, and >800 is a bit, uhh, unlikely. What
I do recall is mention that Pd can suck up 800 times _its_own_volume_
of hydrogen gas, but that is hardly the same thing. I would love to
see some corroboration on this.
 
3) Thanks to Bill Higgins of FermiLab for sending me this paper.
 
4) Notice that it was written back at the beginning of the month.
I suspect strongly that the 2 confirming papers he mentions, if they
turn up at all, will prove to be confirmations of the Brigham Young
work rather than this work.
 
5)  Here is a quote from Morrison, above:
 
"  Fourthly they looked for neutrons using a polythene sphere filled
with BF3.  The count was three times background. In 50 hours they
counted 40,000 neutrons."
 
The P & F paper says "In view of the low counting efficiency, counting
was carried out for 50 hours. Measurements on a 0.4 x 10 cm rod run at
64mA cm^ -2 gave a neutron count 3 times above that of the
background." [page 4] and "...the neutron flux calculated from
measurements with the dosimeter is of the order 4 x 10^4 s^ -1 for a
0.4 x 10cm rod electrode polarised at 64mA cm^ -2" [page 7]
 
In any event, Morrison says they _got_ 40,000 _counts_ in 50 hours,
and the paper says they _calculate_ 40,000 _neutrons_ per second. I
don't know how to explain this coincidence of numbers.
 
Now, if we accept the Morrison number, the background count was about
0.074 counts/sec, unless I have miscalculated. (40000/3 for background
count number, divided by 50 x 3600 for time. I presume that they
subtracted the background from their stated experimental results.)
How does this compare with the BYU results, which state that the
background was "approximately 10^ -3 s^ -1 in the energy region where
2.5MeV neutrons are anticipated"? It seems likely to me that the
background count that Fleischman is talking about here is a total,
rather than a single spectral region.
 
 
			Jon Singer
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jon Singer is (feel free	|
to fill in the blank any way	|	Trigons! I must have trigons!
you wish to, ok?), and		|	Igor, find a trigon shop for me!
is also jon@Apple.COM		|
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
cudkeys:
cuddy7 cudenjon cudfnJon cudlnSinger cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszL cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Vincent Cate /  Re: F and P paper via FTP
     
Originally-From: vac@sam.cs.cmu.edu (Vincent Cate)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: F and P paper via FTP
Date: 7 Apr 89 22:32:50 GMT
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI

 
The first PS files I had did not seem to work on all versions of
LaserWriters.  Alex Pang described a fix to the PS files so that they
would work for LaserWriters as well.  I have modified all of the files and
it seems to be fixed.  For those that already have copies and want to use
a LaserWriter the fix is to delete everything after the %! on the first
line.
 
 
 
Again to get your own copy of the paper:
 
First to get the 16 files using ftp:
 
    ftp sam.cs.cmu.edu
    anonymous
    anonymous
    cd fusion
    binary
    ls
    mget *
    quit
 
 
Then to print it on a unix system with zcat (compress) and a
postscript printer:
 
    foreach FILE (`ls p.*.ps.Z`)
       zcat $FILE | lpr
    end
 
 
 
 
  -- Vince
--
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Charles Keith /  Geological Fusion
     
Originally-From: charles@hp-sdd.hp.com (Charles Keith)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Geological Fusion
Date: 7 Apr 89 16:53:03 GMT
Organization: Hewlett Packard, San Diego

from sci.physics:
>In article <2106@pur-phy>, sho@pur-phy (Sho Kuwamoto) writes:
>[Of course, one *should* say--"Jones and Palmer write . . ."]
>>                A tritium monitoring station was operated at Mauna Loa
>> on Hawaii Island from August 1971 to the end of 1977.  We have found
>> strong correlations between tritium detected at Mauna Loa and nearby
>> volcanic activity in this period of time.
 
Along these same lines...
How many people remember the business many years back when the Red Chinese
(they were red then) claimed they were predicting earthquakes by measuring
the tritium concentration in water wells?  At the time is was roundly poo-
pooed because nobody could think of a reason or mechanism for this effect.
Now we have Jones and Palmer talking about water subduction, volcanoes,
tritium and "piezofusion".  Seems to me like this could be the missing
mechanism, no?  Does anyone out there have information on the original
tritium sampling experiments?  Could there be a connection between the
Chinese experiments and piezofusion?  Inquiring minds want to know.
 
---
Charles Keith               TELE: (619) 592-4472
Hewlett-Packard Co.         UUCP: {hplabs|ucsd|hpfcla}!hp-sdd!charles
16399 W. Bernardo Dr.       Internet: charles%hp-sdd@hplabs.HP.COM
San Diego, CA 92127         Disclaimer: I am absolutely irresponsible.
---
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Stephen King /  Re: Cold fusion as a terrorist weapon?
     
Originally-From: king@dretor.dciem.dnd.ca (Stephen King)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a terrorist weapon?
Date: 7 Apr 89 19:33:10 GMT
Organization: D.C.I.E.M., Toronto, Canada

In article <1216@microsoft.UUCP> mattb@microsoft.UUCP (Matt Bamberger) writes:
> [...]  It's a good thing that terrorists are as dumb as rocks.
 
This is a very dangerous assumption. I cannot refute it from personal
experience, but I would never hold an opinion such as this because it could
be lethal. If cold fusion could easily be used as a terrorist weapon, it
probably would be, at least once. This is certainly an issue that should be
taken seriously.
 
Thanks to Paul and Scott (and the others) who pointed out the acceptability
of this kind of a discussion in this group.
--
* Opinions: personal property of Stephen J King, DCIEM Human Factors Division *
* ...!utzoo!dretor!king   or   king@dretor.dciem.dnd.ca   or   (416) 635-2402 *
cudkeys:
cuddy7 cudenking cudfnStephen cudlnKing cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.08 / James Bond /  Missing Neutrons
     
Originally-From: bond@uts.amdahl.com (James K. Bond)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Missing Neutrons
Date: 8 Apr 89 01:54:35 GMT
Organization: Amdahl Corporation, Sunnyvale CA

Since I'm several years out of studying any of this, perhaps I'm
overlooking something obvious, but there seems to me to be an obvious
alternative reaction that would be worth exploring and would explain
the "missing" neutrons.
 
The most commonly discussed reaction seems to be:
 
	D + D --> 3He + n                       	(1)
 
Seems to me that the real reaction would be:
 
	D + D --> 4He (excited)                 	(2)
 
	4He (excited) --> 3He + n                 	(3)
 
Now in a plasma reaction, the 4He intermediate state would only be
detectable in a vanishingly small faction of the total reactions
because reaction (2) will normally not be able to balance momentum.  So
normally the 4He will only exist as a virtual particle.  However,
assuming you can overcome the problems with momentum balance, an
alternative to (3) is:
 
	4He (excited) --> 4He (ground state) + gamma    (4)
 
(this actually seems to me to be the "preferred" reaction since 4He is
so stable).
 
In the cold fusion experiments, the reaction is taking place not in the
vacuum, but associated with a crystal lattice.  In which case (2) might
be restated as:
 
	D + D --> 4He (excited) + phonon        	(5)
 
and then the 4He decays via (4).
 
There is the possibility that (4) and (5) are forbidden for some other
reason such as conservation of angular momentum.  I did not check on
such additional problems.
 
				Jim Bond (bond@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com)
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / Sho Kuwamoto /  P&F paper
     
Originally-From: sho@pur-phy (Sho Kuwamoto)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: P&F paper
Date: 7 Apr 89 17:56:55 GMT
Organization: Purdue Univ. Physics Dept., W. Lafayette, IN

I just downloaded the P&F paper, and guess what?  I overlooked
the fact that it was postscript source.  So is there a text version
of this file?  Or if anyone at purdue has access to a postsript
printer, could I make a copy?
 
-Sho
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 /  andrew /  Asteroids and Pd fusion
     
Originally-From: andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.space,alt.fusion
Subject: Asteroids and Pd fusion
Date: 8 Apr 89 01:53:06 GMT
Organization: National Semiconductor, Santa Clara

 
The following quantifies the use of the stored energy from P&F Pd to
get to the asteroid belt, for which a deltaV of 7 Km/s is required.
It's assumed that the heat energy is used, stored at about 1e9 J/Kg of
Pd. The existence of a heatsink at 3 degK should be a great help for
the engine design. I am assuming no use of fusion particle byproducts
and am neglecting the weight of deuterium required.
 
If <m> is the mass of the (non-exhausting) Pd fuel and <M> the asteroid
mass returned, the available energy is 1e9.m, and the energy required for
the return trip is 0.5(dV**2)(M + 2.m). Thus for a positive energy budget,
M < 40m. Since it is unlikely that Pd ore is present at 2.5% richness,
the fuel weight will exceed the mined weight of Pd - unless mining is done
_in situ_. In any case, iron, nickel etc. will be capable of being
returned in the raw ore state in quantities about equal to the fuel
weight, assuming 3% ore quality.
 
Taking 5% of the current annual Pd supply as fuel (reasonable for a major
global undertaking like this) or (3.5/20) Moz ~= 5000 Kg.
I am at a loss to specify the power available, which would allow the
calculation of the total trip time - any data, anyone?
=====
Andrew Palfreyman 		USENET: ...{this biomass}!nsc!logic!andrew
National Semiconductor M/S D3969, 2900 Semiconductor Dr., PO Box 58090,
Santa Clara, CA 95052-8090 ; 408-721-4788 		there's many a slip
							'twixt cup and lip
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Matthew Kennel /  Re: Missing Neutrons
     
Originally-From: mbkennel@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Matthew B. Kennel)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Missing Neutrons
Date: 8 Apr 89 03:42:06 GMT
Organization: Princeton University, NJ

In article <16o0I6c3jE101054biA@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com} bond@amdahl.uts.a
dahl.com (James K. Bond) writes:
}Since I'm several years out of studying any of this, perhaps I'm
}overlooking something obvious, but there seems to me to be an obvious
}alternative reaction that would be worth exploring and would explain
}the "missing" neutrons.
}Seems to me that the real reaction would be:
}	D + D --> 4He (excited)                 	(2)
}	4He (excited) --> 3He + n                 	(3)
}
}{deleted}
}
}	D + D --> 4He (excited) + phonon        	(5)
 
Uh, that's a pretty dang big phonon!  It's true that many materials
have "optical branches" of their dispersion relation that enable
them to absorb light, but absorbing MeV's of energy?  I don't
think that at those energies the lattice will repond anything close to
linearly so probably most of the standard analysis (ok 1st semester
solid state is all I've had) will probably be wrong, so who knows?
But it seems unlikely.
 
}				Jim Bond (bond@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com)
 
 
Matt Kennel
mbkennel@phoenix.princeton.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Emmett Black /  Re: Fusion newgroup proposal
     
Originally-From: blackje@sunspot.steinmetz (Emmett Black)
Newsgroups: news.groups,sci.misc,sci.physics,alt.fusion,sci.space
Subject: Re: Fusion newgroup proposal
Date: 8 Apr 89 05:01:22 GMT
Organization: GE Research; Schenectady, NY  12345

In article <1417@meccsd.MECC.MN.ORG> Scott Jensen writes:
>Steve Fischer writes:
>|I suggest an alternative name:  sci.physics.fusion
>|No mistaking the topic there!
>
>Alot  of the discussion started by this cold fusion topic has been along
>the lines of 'utopia here I come' and 'oh no, megadeath', and these
> ...
>have a more general fusion group as a sci group.
>--
>..............................................................................
>Scott C. Jensen
>scj@mecc.MN.ORG
 
 ... and the way the drivel has been turned up on this topic
     it would appear that we need SEVERAL new news groups:
 
	talk.fusion, soc.fusion, alt.fusion, AND sci.physics.fusion
 
So let's PLEASE try to show some restraint - there are several good
books in the library - please look there before posting any more
questions on the order of "where does heavy water come from?" ...
 
This is why "real scientists" don't read news.
Thanks for your support. (flame-off)
 
--Emmett
	J.E.Black; GE Research/K1-3C26; Schenectady, NY 12345
	blackje@crd.ge.com;   ...!uunet!steinmetz!crd!blackje
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / B Sutherland /  Re: Cold fusion: our story so far...
     
Originally-From: bruces@helios.toronto.edu (Bruce Sutherland)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion: our story so far...
Date: 7 Apr 89 17:10:40 GMT
Organization: University of Toronto Physics/Astronomy/CITA

In article <11245@well.UUCP> Jef Poskanzer <jef@helios.ee.lbl.gov> writes:
 
>Here's a summary of the story so far: both the BYU group (Jones, Palmer
>et al.) and the UU group (Pons and Fleischmann) have observed fusion
>neutrons.  They both get about the same rate, 10**3 - 10**4 neutrons
>per second.  This is way too low for any practical power generation,
 
Whoa, whoa, WHOA!  Please report things as accurately as possible.
The BYU guys have observed a small bump on a graph indicating fusion
produced neutrons.  To get this bump they had to subtract out foreground
effects and background effects, which means what they are observing is
a four sigma (some say five sigma) effect.  (i.e. four deviations from the
norm)  In the past such effects involving neutrons inevitably have shown
that it is incorrect to draw any conclusions from these small deviations.
Now, their paper did go to great lengths to demonstrate the accuracy of
their neutron detector but I still think it is a gross exaggeration
to say that fusion neutrons have definitely been observed.
 
 --------------------------------------
Bruce Sutherland (Somewhere in Toronto)
 
   cbosgd 		   \
   ipnh4!csri.utoronto.ca   }  bruces@helios.physics.utoronto.ca
   seismo!ai.utoronto.ca   /
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Jef Poskanzer /  Cold fusion - the extra heat.
     
Originally-From: pokey@well.UUCP (Jef Poskanzer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Cold fusion - the extra heat.
Date: 8 Apr 89 02:12:14 GMT
Organization: Paratheo-Anametamystikhood Of Eris Esoteric, Ada Lovelace Cabal

I saw Stan Pons on TV today, on a program called "Science Journal" -- it's
kind of like Meet The Press.  One of the reporters asked him what he
thought was producing the heat.  He said that his current theory is
D + D -> He4.  His model is that normally, D + D fuses into an excited
state of He4, which almost instantly decays into either He3 + n or T + p.
But his idea is that when it takes place in a metal lattice, the excited
He4 gives up its energy directly to the lattice.
 
So, ilast week's speculation about phonons in the MeV range may not have
been so far off.
---
Jef
 
            Jef Poskanzer   jef@helios.ee.lbl.gov   ...well!pokey
        "What the scientists have in their briefcases is terrifying."
                           -- Nikita Khrushchev
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Michael McClary /  Re: Media cover of cold fusion (was Re: The deal)
     
Originally-From: michael@xanadu.COM (Michael McClary)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Media cover of cold fusion (was Re: The deal)
Date: 8 Apr 89 10:03:18 GMT
Organization: Xanadu Operating Company, Palo Alto, CA

In article <833@umecs.cs.umu.se> eao@umecs.cs.umu.se (Erik Marklund TDB) writes:
>The swedish media has followed the events rather good, and last night on
>the TV-news they reported something interesting:
>
>	A swedish engineer patended a method for producing helium from
>	hydrogen with Palladium back in 1926 (nineteenhundredtwentiesix).
 
If true, it might make it hard to patent the process now.
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Michael McClary /  Re: Cold fusion: our story so far...
     
Originally-From: michael@xanadu.COM (Michael McClary)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion: our story so far...
Date: 8 Apr 89 10:18:46 GMT
Organization: Xanadu Operating Company, Palo Alto, CA

In article <770@helios.toronto.edu> bruces@helios.physics.utoronto.ca
(Bruce Sutherland) writes:
>In article <11245@well.UUCP> Jef Poskanzer <jef@helios.ee.lbl.gov> writes:
>
>>Here's a summary of the story so far: both the BYU group (Jones, Palmer
>>et al.) and the UU group (Pons and Fleischmann) have observed fusion
>>neutrons.  They both get about the same rate, 10**3 - 10**4 neutrons
>>per second.  This is way too low for any practical power generation,
>
>Whoa, whoa, WHOA!  Please report things as accurately as possible.
>The BYU guys have observed a small bump on a graph indicating fusion
>produced neutrons.  To get this bump they had to subtract out foreground
>effects and background effects, which means what they are observing is
>a four sigma (some say five sigma) effect.  (i.e. four deviations from the
>norm)  In the past such effects involving neutrons inevitably have shown
>that it is incorrect to draw any conclusions from these small deviations.
>Now, their paper did go to great lengths to demonstrate the accuracy of
>their neutron detector but I still think it is a gross exaggeration
>to say that fusion neutrons have definitely been observed.
 
I have seen some amazing stuff, but this is the first time I've seen
five standard deviations described as a "small deviation".  Am I
missing something?
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Kent Grant /  Re: So how do we get rid of by products?
     
Originally-From: grant@skat.usc.edu (Kent Grant)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: So how do we get rid of by products?
Date: 8 Apr 89 02:47:21 GMT
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA

In article <338@taniwha.UUCP> paul@taniwha.UUCP (Paul Campbell) writes:
>So suppose we are building a fusion engine of some sort - we have to:
>
>
>	1) squirt D into palladium etc
>	2) wait 'till it's "full" so that fusion starts
>	3) collect the power .... :-)
 
>	Paul
>
	Hi Paul,
	Can you or anyone else tell me what is the difference
	in the danger from fussion compared to fission?
 
	-Kent
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / John Logajan /  Fusion - poisoning electrodes?
     
Originally-From: logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Fusion - poisoning electrodes?
Date: 7 Apr 89 22:12:39 GMT
Organization: Network Systems Corp. Mpls MN

What are they referring to when they mention "poisoning" of the electrode,
and why would that increase the diffusion rate?
 
P.S. The P+F preprint via ftp/postscript from sam.cs.cmu.edu seemed to have
a number of pages that were partially or totally scrambled.  I don't know
where the problem was introduced, since this is the first time I've ever
been involved with either procedure.
 
--
- John M. Logajan @ Network Systems; 7600 Boone Ave; Brooklyn Park, MN 55428  -
- ...rutgers!umn-cs!ns!logajan / logajan@ns.network.com / john@logajan.mn.org -
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / S Chandrashekha /  Re: Coverage of it all (Was Re: The deal)
     
Originally-From: chandy@brand.usc.edu (Sundaresan Chandrashekhar)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Coverage of it all (Was Re: The deal)
Date: 8 Apr 89 04:12:06 GMT
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA

In article <Apr.7.02.36.27.1989.15293@pilot.njin.net> sommers@pilot.njin
net (liz) writes:
>Pons was on Science Journal tonight.  I have no idea what time this
>normally shows, as I get it off the PBS feed on my satelitte dish.  They
>gave him about 20 minutes (I missed half of it).  The panel seemed to be
>skeptical about it all.
>
>Last week a MIT professor barely missed calling Pons a liar on the same
>show.
>--
>lizzy
>sommers@njin.pilot.net
 
	A lot of scepticism is being openly expressed in the media. In the LA times
(April 6, Metro section), there was an article by a Prof. H.W.Lewis
of UC at Santa Barbara,
in which he states unequivocally that the Utah team did not achieve
cold fusion. According
to him,
	" The fusion process produces energetic radiation ( that is where the energy comes
	from), and half the time an energetic neutron. If the Utah scientists had really
	produced as much as a watt of power through fusion, they would have been bathed in
	a deadly beam of neutrons that fried them to a crisp. ... That they lived to hold
	their press conference is unambiguous proof that they did not produce any noticeable
	amount of power through cold fusion. "
 He goes on to make some rather harsh remarks to the effect that the experiments of F&P,
and others of the kind, are "distractions [that] impair our will
to attack the hard jobs".
 
___________________
chandra.
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------------------------------
1989.04.07 / pri=-10 Lynne /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: sl@van-bc.UUCP (pri=-10 Stuart Lynne)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 7 Apr 89 18:13:46 GMT
Organization: Wimsey Associates, Vancouver, BC.

In article <11789@ut-emx.UUCP> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
>> >  a. Palladium comes from S. Africa.
 
>> It also comes from RUSSIA, which is even worse!   :-)
 
>But the real killer is that the only North American source of any size
>is in *Canada*!  Next thing you know they'll be asking us to accept
>that funny-looking money of theirs. :-)
 
 
We'll sell you as much heavy water as you want too! Rumour has that we even
have a heavy water plant in mothballs somewhere on the east coast. (Demand
for Candu plants didn't ramp up as fast as people were hoping I guess.)
 
We do take that funny US Green stuff though.
 
--
Stuart.Lynne@wimsey.bc.ca uunet!van-bc!sl 604-937-7532(voice) 604-939-4768(fax)
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Ric Helton /  Re: The deal
     
Originally-From: RCH@cup.portal.com (Ric C Helton)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: The deal
Date: 8 Apr 89 14:40:38 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

4/5/89 13:11 joel@peora.ccur.com (Joel Upchurch)
 
>                                        It seems to me that fax
>achines may cause a fundemental change in the way that scientific
>nformation is spread. Current computer networks have the limitation
>hat the person you want to send to may not be on the same net, or the
>nformation may not be in machine readable form. But with fax machines,
>ou can send to practically anybody in a matter of minutes.
 
...provided they have a compatible fax machine.  I think right
now there are more computer network users than fax machine
owners.  But you are right, both computer networks *and* fax
machine technology (really the same telecomm electronics) are
changing the way any information in our society/world is being
distributed.
 -Ric Helton RCH@cup.portal.com
 -Freestyle BBS 404/546-8256
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Davin Yap /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: yap@me.utoronto.ca (Davin Yap)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 8 Apr 89 16:46:58 GMT
Organization: University of Toronto Mechanical Engineering

In article <2353@van-bc.UUCP> sl@van-bc.UUCP (pri=-10 Stuart Lynne) writes:
>In article <11789@ut-emx.UUCP> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
>>> >  a. Palladium comes from S. Africa.
>
>>> It also comes from RUSSIA, which is even worse!   :-)
>
>>But the real killer is that the only North American source of any size
>>is in *Canada*!  Next thing you know they'll be asking us to accept
>>that funny-looking money of theirs. :-)
>
>
>We'll sell you as much heavy water as you want too! Rumour has that we even
>have a heavy water plant in mothballs somewhere on the east coast. (Demand
>for Candu plants didn't ramp up as fast as people were hoping I guess.)
>
>We do take that funny US Green stuff though.
>
Ain't no rumour.  The reason the plant was shut down 'cuz we've got TONS
of the stuff.  Not only that, 'cuz we use heavy water as a coolant in our
reactors (we only have low pressure reactors in Canada - they're safer
and can be refueled online - eat that GE/Westinghouse) we've got lotsa
Tritium.  If the D + T reaction proves to be more viable then straight
deuterium, this is other big plus.  There was talk in Ontario not long
ago about selling our Tritium to the US ($50K per ounce!) so they could
stick it in their thermonuclear devices (re. BOMBS!!!! yuck :-((() - we'll
keep it now, thank you very much!
 
Davin Yap	yap@me.utoronto.ca  OR  ...uunet!utai!utme!yap
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Ward Page /  Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
     
Originally-From: page@ferrari.ece.uiuc.edu (Ward C. Page)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
Date: 8 Apr 89 17:57:03 GMT

 
>> 	There *was* a fission powered experimental plane.  Forget the name;
>> it was an X-something.  I think it was a converted B29.  Had the reactor
>> tucked into the back end of the tail.
 
The aircraft you are thinking of was a converted B-36.  The reactor was
actually tucked right in the middle of the aircraft.  There were several
flights with the reactor in the plane but only the last flight had the
reactor running.  This was to test the effectiveness of the shielding.
The idea behind the reactor was to allow nearly unlimited flying time, it
had nothing to do with increasing airspeed.  The Air Force canceled the
project before the drive system from reactor to props could be finished
(there were tons of problems).  If I remember correctly, the last flight
occured AFTER the project was cancelled.  I used to work in building 125
at General Dynamics.  Everybody called it the 'nukular building' because
it was where the reactor was devleloped and tested.  This explains why
the doorstops are lead bricks - leftover from the days of the reactor tests.
 
 
Ward Page
page@ferrari.ece.uiuc.edu
University of Illinois
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Narayan Raja /  P/F CERN lecture report  --  I
     
Originally-From: raja@cpsvax.cps.msu.edu (Narayan S Raja)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: P/F CERN lecture report  --  I
Date: 8 Apr 89 20:34:09 GMT
Organization: Michigan State University, Computer Science Department

I got this report from a friend (tate@suhep, Ranjit Tate)
at Syracuse Univ. :
 
 
 
Originally-From:	SUHEP1::VIVEKJ       "Vivek Jain - Syracuse Univ."
 3-APR-1989 20:13:05.98
Subj:	cold fusion news
 
                                                           31 March 1989.
              PHYSICS NEWS - COLD FUSION?
 
Dear E632 and WA84 Colleagues,
  There have been many reports in the newspapers that Prof. Fleischmann of
Southampton and Dr. Pons of Utah have evidence for cold fusion of
deuterium by electrochemistry. This afternoon Prof. Fleischmann gave a
seminar in CERN. Because of the many media reports, the auditorium was crowded
and although I arrived 20 minutes early, I had to sit on the steps. As I have
given several lectures on Wrong Results in Physics, I went to this and also to
the press conference afterwards - especially as the news reports had been
very hard to understand scientifically, but if true, this could have a major
impact on the world economy.
  Martin Fleischmann had a reputation as a major expert in his subject. As his
talk developed, it became clear that he was a first class scientist and it
seems to me that he has made a major breakthrough, though what the
fundamentals processes are is not yet fully understood.
  Let me try and explain what I think I learnt (I talked to him for a while
afterwards, so it may not be too bad).
  Basically the catalyst used, palladium Pd, is a face-centred crystal. It can
absorb a certain amount of hydrogen. If an electrical potential is applied,
then over a period of time it can absorb a great deal. For F & P, they reached
0.6 atoms of deuterium per atom of Palladium after three months.
    They made tests with four rods each of 10 cm length and of diameters
0.1, 0.2, 0.4 and 0.8 cm. They only have good measurements for the first
three as one morning when they came in they found that the fourth and largest
rod had melted and the fume cupboard was starting to smoulder!
They made calorimetric measurements and found that they were getting more
heat out than they had put in and this effect increased with the diameter of the
rod. It seems to be a volume effect and not a surface effect. The excess heat is
about 5 megajoules per cm3 which is about 100 times greater than any known
chemical process.
  A second measurement was by putting a NaI crystal close when they recorded
gammas. The energy spectrum of the gammas was sharply peaked between 2000
and 2400 which is characteristic of the (n,gamma) reaction on hydrogen. This
could be explained as the neutrons interacting in the water bath round the
experiment.
  Thirdly they observed tritium production and measured and found a
"characteristic" spectrum (I did not understand this fully, partly as he had
an incomplete scale on the graph, but see later).
 Fourthly they looked for neutrons using a polythene sphere filled with BF3.
The count was three times background. In 50 hours they counted 40 000 neutrons.
However there is a point that is a stumbling block for particle physicists - if
you take the rate of release of heat, then there should be 10 E 13 or 14
neutrons - a huge discrepancy. He does not have the equipment to measure
the neutron spectrum - the neutrons have to pass through the surrounding water
bath which tends to thermalise them.
  A conclusion that can be drawn from Fleischmann's talk is that the heating
is not due to the reactions
              2D + 2D  ---> 3He + n                               (1)
  or          2D + 3T  ---> 4He + n                               (2)
which are the ones that spring to mind.
 He gave a table of the excess enthalpy in the Pd rod cathodes expressed as a
percentage of breakeven values;
                0.1 mm   81%
                0.2     189%
                0.4     839%
>From this it can be judged that it was not too surprising that the 0.8 cm
rod melted!
  He opened his talk with a basic discussion of electrochemistry.
 
            D2O + e-   <--->  D(absorber) + OD-
 
           D(absorber)  <--->  D(lattice)
 
      D(absorber) + D2O + e-  <--->  D2 + OD-
 
  With the applied field the D can go over the potential barrier by applying
a Potl. Difference at the interface. The result is that inside the Pd there
can be many collisions without repulsion. Effectively there is a PD of 0.8 eV
which can translate into a compression of 10 E 27 atmos. i.e. it would require
this enormous pressure to achieve the same PD. Thus electrochemistry is high
energy chemistry! The D is in a sea of high electron density. The structural
or coherent strength of the Pd is 4000 atm. Thus it is a very strange kind of
Quantum Mechanics (his phrase).
  I have to go to collect my daughter at the airport, but will try and
continue later.
 
                                                            1 April 1989.
                                              (despite the date, it is serious!)
  Re-reading what I wrote yesterday. I realise that I have been trying to
explain simply. The actual talk contained some more details and two tables of
results that I had only time to copy down partially. There was a fuller
discussion of electrochemistry.
  The question now is what is happening. The observations are of a source of
heat, of emision of tritium, gammas and of neutrons, but the number of
neutrons are many orders of magnitude less than would be expected if the heat
produced came from reactions producing neutrons. Fleischmann talks as if you
have to modify quantum mechanics - this I do not believe - we have to apply it
differently.
  An additional piece of information that he gave at his press conference but
not at his seminar, was that the particle emission was not uniform but had
fluctuations which were much larger than statistical - this I think is a very
important piece of information.
  There are a lot of different theories being discussed. The following
comments should be considered private, qualitative and not necessarily
correct.
  The catalyst, palladium works by accepting an incredible number of deuterium
nuclei in the spaces of its face-centred cubic lattice. The distance between
 each
deuterium nucleus is therefore reduced. This was first demonstrated by the
observation of muon-induced catalysis where in deuterium, the electron is
replaced by a muon. As the muon is some 200 times heavier, the proton and
neutron are pulled closer together so that the probability of fusion is greatly
increased - by many orders of magnitude. Now there are two suggestions;
  1. Since the deuterium nuclei are in a very dense electron field, it may be
that the electrons have an effective mass much greater than normal and this
increases the probabilty of the nuclei tunnelling through the barrier.
  2. the applied potential difference drives more and more deuterium nuclei
into the spaces between the palladium atoms so that the separation of the
nuclei decreases so that the probability of fusion increases dramatically.
  Personally I have a preference for the second approach, but it is always
possible that both are applicable.
  Instead of saying that there is a discrepancy between the number of
neutrons produced and the heat produced, perhaps we should assume that all
the results are correct and that the reactions ocurring are different.
Maybe the dominant reaction is fusion, D + D ---> 4He, but we need
something else to share the energy and momentum produced - this could be the
close neighbouring structure of the lattice. Thus the dominant reaction is to
produce heat! Of course other reactions will also occur which is why there
is an observation of tritium and one would expect some production of 3He and
4He and neutrons and gammas. If this were true, and again this is mainly
a suggestion which needs experimental confirmation, then this would have
tremendous social effects as we would have a simple source of energy
without the particulate matter, sulphur and other gasses from coal and oil
fired power stations that are killing so many today. Also the radiation
danger would be very much less than with nuclear reactors ( sell your coal
and oil shares if you have any!)
  In answer to a question, Fleischmann said that they had tried to look at
3He and 4He production and ratio, but the experiment is difficult for them
and they prefer to leave that for experts who have the equipment - for they have
been using their own money for 5 years.
  Looking again at my notes, I discover that John Ellis had said in the
discussion that there could be little Coulomb repulsion as there could be a
classical oscillation of the lattice.
  Before the Seminar, things were rather disturbed with the media - lots of
TV crews and flashes popping off. The Chairman, Carlo, asked them all to leave
explaining this was a scientific meeting and he did not want questions on
any other subject, but afterwards there would be a press conference. After some
time the media left. At the end of Fleischmann's talk, the TV crews re-entered
and had to be requested to leave again before the question period.
  On the way to the press conference, Fleischmann was told that there had been
a report on the radio that a group (at Columbia?) had confirmed his result. He
said he had not heard this and during the Press Conference he continued to
emphasise, in a very proper manner, that before leaping to conclusions, there
should be further confirming evidence.
  Fleischmann had described his other press conference in Utah as awful,
but this one went well with Carlo a good Chairman - who was also asked
questions. Fleischmann explained that the work was intentional and not
an accident. He said that after verification, it might take 10 to 20 years
to develop an economically viable system. Carlo was asked his opinion and said
that "Dr. Fleischmann has planted a seed - will the seed grow up? I think yes"
Fleischmann said that he believed in Karl Popper's philosophy - you cannot prove
something right, you can only prove it wrong. "We have spent 5 years trying to
prove ourselves wrong, now other people should try".
  In explaining why they did it, "it was not to do an ego trip (though all
scientists are on an ego trip to some extent), but to try and find a
plentiful source of energy. We have a social conscience"
  Question - "There was a sceptical atmosphere in the room, did you feel
like a chemistry bull in an arena of physics toreadors?"
  Answer - "Are people correct to be sceptical?, yes, it is correct to be
sceptical. But it was not a bad atmosphere. Our experiment fits partly into
accepted ideas but not entirely, therefore either experiment is wrong or
we have extended the conceptions of possible fusion mechanisms".
  Carlo was asked if he found the meeting strange - "No, I am at home in my
own lab".
  Question - "Do you think it is correct?". Answer(MF) - "I think it is correct,
but others should show it is correct". (Note, this was typical of some of the
questions where the journalist asked "for a good quote").
  Carlo was asked if CERN should work on fusion. He replied " There are
different science cultures. In an orchestra everyone tries to play his own
instrument, and does not have other instruments. But we have quantum mechanics
in common. We should do what we do best. But there is also cross-fertilisation
between chemistry and nuclear physics" He also joked that this was the first
time that a chemist had discovered a neutron!
  Question - "Any military applications?"
  Answer(MF) - "There will always be some military application of anything, but
we do not know of any such thing"
  Question - " You said you did not have enough money, have you been offered
money since your press conference last week"?
  Answer - "Up to now have used our own money as we thought it unlikely to
work, so there were some restrictions. Since then we have been approached with
offers but as our capacity to spend money is limited, we have to plan carefully.
  Question - "If it is fusion what will its effect be on other fusion research?"
  Answer - " Glad you asked that. It would be a total disaster to cut back on
other fusion research. Ours is small scale, theirs is large scale generation
of electricity. It would be extremely foolish to cut back".
  There was more, but I hope this gives the flavour - both Fleischmann and Carlo
aquitted themselves very well and responsibly.
  Friedrich Dydak had told me he had two papers confirming the F & P work and
I could copy them. Later when I was returning them, Fleischmann came in for
another TV interview and we talked while he was waiting for the lighting to be
set up. He had not seen the papers, so I gave him copies. The main author was
Stephen Jones who is at the BYU in Utah beside Dr. Pons. We looked quickly at
the papers - he was particularly interested in the dates on the papers.
I explained I was interested particularly for two reasons. Firstly as I was
possibly the first to observe fusion in Europe - in the early sixties I was
scanning bubble chamber film of deuterium and normally when there is the decay
chain,
      pion   --->  muon  --->  electron
the muon always has the same short range (if the pion is at rest). But one day
I observed an extra long range for the muon. I spent some time measuring
the curvature and angles of the tracks, but could not explain it. However
someone told me that the Berkeley bubble chamber group had found it and it
had been explained as the muon replacing an electron and causing fusion. At
this Luis insisted that this should be treated as a secret, but quickly it
was calculated that it had no military or economical value. So I left it and
went on to new things(incidently the Scientific American article of July 1987
by Rafelski and Jones on Cold Nuclear Fusion says that this muon -induced fusion
was first suggested by Frank and Sakharov in the late 1940's).
    Secondly I said I had given several serious lectures on Wrong Results
in Physics and found that they exhibited certain characteristics so that
they could be recognised before they had been proved wrong - after the
press reports I wondered if this was a case in point, but after I had
heard his conference, I was inclined to believe that his results were
correct. He did not seem to appreciate this too much, not unnaturally,
but we continued talking and he told me some remarkable things. I mentioned
that after the press conference, Dr. Wind was looking for him as he used to
work in Utrecht on electrochemistry and had been able to insert 1000 hydrogen
ions per atom of palladium catalyst. Dr. Fleischmann (who had attained 0.6 ions
after 3 months) said he did not believe this number of 1000. However
talking with Per-Olaf Hulth this morning, he had checked this subject last night
and read that 850 ions of hydrogen had been inserted - this could be used as
hydrogen storage cells for cars driven by hydrogen - air mixtures. If I
remember rightly, Fleischmann had replied that they had not prepared the
surface of their palladium rod, and this could make a big difference. If
it were possible to insert so many deuterium ions into palladium, then the
rate of fusion would be greatly increased (or the charging time would be less
than 3 months).
 
  The two papers are;
1. "Observation of Cold Nuclear Fusion in Condensed Matter" by S.E. Jones
and others of Brigham Young Univ. and J. Rafelski of Univ. of Arizona.
2. "Limits on Cold Fusion in Condensed Matter; a Parametric study" by
J. Rafelski and others of Arizona and S.E. Jones of BYU.
  The main point of the first paper is that they claim to have observed
neutrons when there was low voltage electrolytic fusion of deuterons into
metallic titanium or palladium. They believe this is from the reaction;
        d + d  --->  3He(0.82 MeV) + n(2.45 MeV)              (1)
The distribution of counts in different channels give a broad enhancement
which the authors say corresponds to neutrons of 2.45 MeV. This looks
convincing - just; it would be good to repeat this.
  They say they have not yet(?!advertising?) obtained results regarding the
parallel reaction;
          d + d  ---> p(3.02 MeV)  +  t(1.01 MeV)                  (3)
  The electrolyte contains various minmeral salts and they say that their
evidence indicates the importance of co-deposition of deuterons and metal ions
at the negative electrode. "hydrogen bubbles were observed to form on the Pd
foils only after several minutes of electrolysis, suggesting the rapid
absorbtion of deuterons into the foil; oxygen bubbles formed at the anode
immediately". The palladium pieces were 0.025cm thick and had the surfaces
roughened or were mossy. They do not say that it took 3 months to get started
by charging the deuterons into the palladium (private comment - this suggests
to me that Fleischmann and Pons would have improved things if they had
increased the surface to volume ratio of the catalyst and roughened its surface,
but it is hard to be sure. However it does suggest that it is possible to
charge the catalyst in much less than three months).
  The experimental part of their paper gives an impression of haste, but there
are a lot of other interesting things in their paper;
In a deuterium molecule the separation between the deuterons is 0.74 A and the
d-d fusion rate is very slow about 10 E -70 per D2 molecule per sec ( calculated
in an interesting paper by Van Siclen, C.D. and Jones, S.E., Journal of Physics
G Nucl. Phys. 12 (1986) 213 - here they state that the fusion rates for
reactions (1) and (3) are nearly equal over the range 10 to 30 KeV. They also
discuss whether piezonuclear fusion - i.e. by pressure - within the liquid
metallic hydrogen core of Jupiter could account for the fact that the planet
radiates 1.5 times as much heat as it receives from the sun. However they
concluded that this process was many orders of magnitude too small to be a
significant energy source - this is where the idea of Fleischmann and Pons of
using electrolytic catalysis is so important). However in muon-induced catalysis
the internuclear separation is reduced by about the ratio of the muon to the
electron masses (200) resulting in the fusion rate increasing by an enormous
factor, 80 orders of magnitude! In the second paper this variation of fusion
rate as a function of the distance is quantified. This made me think of the
observation by Fleischmann that they had observed large fluctuations in the
signals - for the number of deuterons in a space in the lattice of Palladium
is discrete and given by Poisson statistics hence the distance between the
deuterons will vary appreciably - this and other factors(roughness of surface)
could cause there to be local spots hot in space and time, since the fusion rate
varies so violently with distance. In addition to the reactions (1) and (3),
there can occur the reaction on tritium that will exist to some varable extent,
            2D + 3T  --->  4He + n                            (2)
Although there is less tritium than deuterium, this reaction has a much higher
cross section - so that this reaction (2) could also help fluctuations (but
these comments on fluctations are my own, so treat them with appropriate
caution).
 Paper (1) also has an interesting chapter on Geophysical considerations
(or the Hawaii effect). Sea water contains about one part in 7000 of
deuterium. By subduction water is carried down to the earth's mantle
where it might undergo fusion via the reaction;
                 p + d  --->  3He + gamma(5.4 MeV)          (4)
under the extreme pressure and temperature there. Calculations are done which
indicate that a substantial contribution to the heat flux through the crust
could come from cold fusion. This heat could also help to explain the localised
heat of volcanism at subduction zones. They quote that the 3He to 4He ratio is
high in rocks, liquids and gases from volcanoes. Further they then predict that
tritium will be produced from d + d fusion and since tritium is relatively
short-lived(12 years half-life), observation of tritium  would suggest a
geologically recent process. On the Mauna Loa mountain on Hawaii, tritium was
monitored from 1971 to 1977 and a correlation is shown in the paper between
the tritium level and volcanic activity. This is very striking for the 1972
Mauna Ulu eruption but later eruption signals were partly confused by
atomic bomb tests. They estimate that in the Mauna Ulu eruption 100 curies of
tritium was released per day for 30 days!
   In paper (1), it is also reported that after diamonds are sliced with a
laser, the concentration of 4He and 3He has been measured - it is reported that
the 4He is distributed uniformly while the 3He is concentrated in spots
suggesting cold fusion reactions. Similar anomalies have been reported in
metal foils.
  The authors also calculate that the excess heat from Jupiter could be
accounted for from cold fusion in the core consisting of metallic hydrogen plus
iron silicate.
  The second paper calculates the cold fusion rate of d-d as a function of
1 - relative energy, 2 - separation of two hydrogen nuclei in a sphere,
3 - the effective electron mass,  4 - the effective electron charge. They
do not consider the effects of the lattice of a catalyst as do Fleischmann
and Pons.
 
  It is probable that some readers will be thinking that this letter has
wandered off strict physics news. They are right. It is intentional as I
feel this subject will become so important to society that we must consider
the broader implications as well as the scientific ones. Looking into a
cloudy crystal ball, it is not impossible to foresee the situation that
the experiments are so easy that schools will be doing them, that many new
companies will start up, most(not all) will fail and the present big power
companies will be running down their oil and coal power stations while they
are building deuterium separation plants and new power plants based on cold
fusion. No new nuclear power stations will be built except for military needs.
There will be very little if any research on high temperature(plasma) fusion.
Petrol will probably still be used for cars. Overall pollution will start to
be less. Ecologists will be talking about the contamination from radioactive
tritium and asking about the effect of this tritium on the ozone layer.
 
CONCLUSIONS
            It is known(from muon cataysis) that if two nuclei of deuterium or
tritium are held close together, then they can fuse releasing energy.
 Fleischmann
and Pons thought of achieving this by using electrolysis to insert deuterium
nuclei inside a palladium catalyst. They observed production of more heat than
they put in. They also observed tritium production, gammas of an energy
consistent with neutrons interacting with the surrounding water bath, and
neutrons directly. They thus conclude they have observed fusion of heavy
hydrogen producing energy, i.e. cold fusion. A paper by Jones et al. reports
on the operation of similar electrolytic cells with observation of neutrons
with an energy spectrum consistent with that expected from deuterium fusion.
They also describe interesting though rather anecdotal evidence for fusion
in volcanoes, Jupiter, diamonds and metal foils. The theory, while not fully
developed, suggests that the deuterium nuclei inside the lattice of the
catalyst, are held so closely together that the probability of fusion(the
tunneling effect) is dramatically increased by many orders of magnitude. it
may be expected that this will cause major changes in the energy industry and
major social, economic and hence political changes.
cudkeys:
cuddy8 cudenraja cudfnNarayan cudlnRaja cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszL cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Narayan Raja /  P/F CERN lecture report --  II
     
Originally-From: raja@cpsvax.cps.msu.edu (Narayan S Raja)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: P/F CERN lecture report --  II
Date: 8 Apr 89 20:36:15 GMT
Organization: Michigan State University, Computer Science Department

This is the second part of the report I got from
a friend at Syracuse Univ. (tate@suhep, Ranjit Tate):
 
 
 
Originally-From:	SUHEP::VIVEKJ       "Vivek Jain - Syracuse Univ."
 4-APR-1989 14:36:59.58
Subj:	some additions to the news of cold fusion.
 
This is in addition to the previous note I circulated.
 
                                           Vivek Jain
 
 
ADDITION                                                 4 April 1989.
        The problem is to find an explanation for all the data, or alternatively
most of the data.
  The biggest problem is the discrepancy between the heat produced and the
rate of neutron production in the reaction
         d + d  --->  3He + n                            (1)
  Occurring with about equal cross section is the reaction
         d + d  --->   t  + p                            (3)
  The other energetically possible reaction is
         d + d  --->  4He
but this needs something else to carry off the energy - it could be a gamma
but the cross section for this reaction is much less than for (1) or (3).
The suggestion has been made that it could be the lattice of the palladium
         d + d  --->  4He + L                             (5)
where L is the Lattice.
This sounds attractive as the ratio of the cross section for reaction (5)
to reactions (1) and (3) is not known.
  In discussing with John Ellis this morning he suggested a three-body reaction
         d + d + L  --->  4He + L*                        (6)
where L* would be an excited state of the Lattice.
  However the energy released is about 19 MeV and this seems too much for the
lattice which normals measures its excited states in eV. However if an entire
region of the lattice were to move essentially coherently, say a few 1000
atoms, then MeV energies might be  obtained. However there is the problem of
timing - the nuclear reaction takes place in a much shorter time than the
period of oscillation of a lattice.
  So while reactions (1) and (3) probably do occur infrequently, we still
need a reaction mechanism which is dominant and gives out most of the heat.
  This afternoon I heard from two sources that Fleischmann and Pons used
Lithium salts in their electrolytic solution! If the electrolysis were then to
drive the lithium into the Palladium together with the deuterium then it would
be would be possible to have the reaction
         d + 6Li  --->  4He + 4He                          (7)
This is beautiful as it would explain how one gets energy(heat) but with
fewer neutrons.
  Looking again at the paper of Jones et al., they say they also used
lithium salts! Their actual wording is of interest; "we developed the following
(unoptimised) prescription for the electrolytic cells. The electrolyte is a
mixture of about 160 g of deuterium oxide(D2O) plus various metal salts in
about 0.2 g amounts each: FeSO4.7H2O,  NiCl2.6H20,  PdCl2,  CaCo3,  Li2So4.H2O
NaSO4.10H2O,  CaH4(PO4)2.H2O,  TiOSO4.H2SO4.8H2O, and a very small amount of
AuCN. (Our evidence indicates the importance of co-deposition of deuterons
and metal ions at the negative electrode)".
  Thus the experimental results can possibly be explained if the
deuteron - lithium reaction (7) is dominant and the d - d reactions (1) and(3)
occur but at a much lower rate.
  Thus the ratio of heat to neutrons could be varied by varying the electrolyte
composition.
  In the paper of Jones et al. that records anomalies in volcano gases, Jupiter
energy balance and 3He to 4He ratios in diamonds and metal foils, these effects
could possibly be explained as resulting from different conditions and elements
in the "electrolytic cell".
  It should be noted that if (7) is the dominant reaction, then most of the
energy will be emitted as Helium-4 nuclei and these should be searched for.
Also these Helium-4 nuclei will cause severe damage to the Palladium rods
which could also be studied. Again this damage could be important in
constructing a power plant which is economic.
cudkeys:
cuddy8 cudenraja cudfnNarayan cudlnRaja cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Henry Spencer /  Re: Asteroids and Pd fusion
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.space,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Asteroids and Pd fusion
Date: 8 Apr 89 21:29:05 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <10346@nsc.nsc.com> andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew) writes:
>... The existence of a heatsink at 3 degK should be a great help for
>the engine design...
 
Not as much as you think.  Getting the heat out to that heatsink is
*not* a trivial problem.  The shuttle uses the entire inner surface of
its payload-bay doors as a heat radiator.  If you look at pictures of
the space station, you'll see two sets of big flat panels sticking
out -- solar panels, and radiators.  Fusion rockets are likely to have
quite serious cooling problems, at least in high-performance versions.
(Chemical rockets dump heat into their fuel, but a high-performance
fusion rocket doesn't use fuel quickly enough for that approach to work.)
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Ed Nather /  Re: Why is fusion good?
     
Originally-From: nather@ut-emx.UUCP (Ed Nather)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Why is fusion good?
Date: 8 Apr 89 16:03:45 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <1989Apr6.174540.1700@utzoo.uucp>, henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
>
> High-energy neutrons do indeed induce radioactivity in most materials.
 
> It's also relevant that the F&P experiment, if the reports are taken at
> face value, does not generate nearly as many neutrons as it "should".
>
 
As has already been suggested here, there are reactions involving Lithium --
which was present in the E&P experiment in the form of an electrolyte, to
promote conduction -- which might explain both the long "charging time"
before anything happens and the "heat sans neutrons."
 
         6    2       4
       Li  + H  -> 2He
 
I don't know much about Lithium diffusion, but I know it doesn't take 10
DAYS for Deuterium to diffuse into Palladium.  Should it take Lithium that
long, then perhaps the "extra heat" came from Li-D fusion, but only after
Li was able to get into the Palladium lattice in sufficient quantities to
make enough excess heat to be noticed.
 
I'm sure F&P thought of this, but may not want to speculate without evidence.
Astronomers, on the other hand, have a much different tradition ...
 
--
Ed Nather
Astronomy Dept, U of Texas @ Austin
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.09 /  andrew /  Re: Asteroids and Pd fusion
     
Originally-From: andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.space,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Asteroids and Pd fusion
Date: 9 Apr 89 03:01:13 GMT
Organization: National Semiconductor, Santa Clara

In article <1989Apr8.212905.131@utzoo.uucp>, henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
> In article <10346@nsc.nsc.com> andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew) writes:
> >... The existence of a heatsink at 3 degK should be a great help for
> >the engine design...
>
> Not as much as you think.  Getting the heat out to that heatsink is
> *not* a trivial problem.  The shuttle uses the entire inner surface of
> its payload-bay doors as a heat radiator.  If you look at pictures of
> the space station, you'll see two sets of big flat panels sticking
> out -- solar panels, and radiators.  Fusion rockets are likely to have
> quite serious cooling problems, at least in high-performance versions.
 
Thanks - I didn't know that. Since we're talking about interplanetary
travel, the convential cylinder is about the dumbest design then (except
the sphere).
Maybe we'll see "flatfish" formed from a triple laminate, whereby
the outer layers reflect off sun energy and provide shadow for the inner
heatsink surface. This design only works well if the outer layers are
capable of continuous movement, else the effective heatsink temperature
would increase. This is just off the top of my head.
=====
Andrew Palfreyman 		USENET: ...{this biomass}!nsc!logic!andrew
National Semiconductor M/S D3969, 2900 Semiconductor Dr., PO Box 58090,
Santa Clara, CA 95052-8090 ; 408-721-4788 		there's many a slip
							'twixt cup and lip
cudkeys:
cuddy9 cudenandrew cudlnandrew cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Mark Zenier /  Re: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
     
Originally-From: markz@ssc.UUCP (Mark Zenier)
Newsgroups: misc.legal,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
Date: 8 Apr 89 20:36:16 GMT
Organization: SSC, Inc., Seattle, WA

In article <6903@hoptoad.uucp>, tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney) writes:
>
> Not even that long.  All patents are public.  Anyone can buy a copy for
> a dollar.  You can't hide something that's patented, period.
 
All unclassified patents may be public.  Stuff deemed important to
national security can really get tied up in knots.
 
Mark Zenier    uunet!nwnexus!pilchuck!ssc!markz    markz@ssc.uucp
                            uunet!amc!
                      uw-beaver!tikal!
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / John Woods /  Re: Heavy Water
     
Originally-From: john@frog.UUCP (John Woods)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Heavy Water
Date: 8 Apr 89 23:54:00 GMT
Organization: Misanthropes-R-Us

In article <2207@mentor.cc.purdue.edu>, ain@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Pat-bob White) writes:
>    From what I recall of my chemistry days, D2O boils at about .1 deg C higher
> than H2O.. if this number is correct, separation could be as simple as
> distillation.
>    Anyone have a CRC they can check this with?  (I'm not a chemist anymore, so
> I don't have one :(
I'm not a chemist, I don't even play one on TV, but I just happen to have
the Rubber Bible.  Page F-4 of the 69th edition of the Handbook of Chemistry
and Physics says D2O boils at 101.42*C at 0.101325MPa.  D-183 says that
regular water boils at 100.000 at 760.0 mmHg (which, after a long search,
turns out to be equal to 0.101325MPa.  Blech!).
 
--
John Woods, Charles River Data Systems, Framingham MA, (508) 626-1101
...!decvax!frog!john, john@frog.UUCP, ...!mit-eddie!jfw, jfw@eddie.mit.edu
		"Back off, man, I'm a SCIENTIST!"
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / H Henson /  Re: Heavy Water
     
Originally-From: hkhenson@cup.portal.com (H Keith Henson)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Heavy Water
Date: 8 Apr 89 19:04:55 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

I don't remember where I read it, or even the decade, but biological process
reject heavy water.  The runoff water from the malting process is enriched
somewhat in deuterium, though to what degree I cannot remember.
Keith Henson hkhenson@cup.portal.com
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.09 / Dave Mack /  Re: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
     
Originally-From: csu@alembic.UUCP (Dave Mack)
Newsgroups: misc.legal,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
Date: 9 Apr 89 17:53:25 GMT
Organization: Alembic Systems

In article <1764@ssc.UUCP> markz@ssc.UUCP (Mark Zenier) writes:
>In article <6903@hoptoad.uucp>, tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney) writes:
>>
>> Not even that long.  All patents are public.  Anyone can buy a copy for
>> a dollar.  You can't hide something that's patented, period.
>
>All unclassified patents may be public.  Stuff deemed important to
>national security can really get tied up in knots.
 
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the US Supreme Court rule several
years ago that a patent owner can be forced to relinquish the rights
to a patent if it can be shown that the intent in holding the patent
is to prevent use of the technology?
 
I think some inventor sued IBM (???) because IBM had purchased the
exclusive rights to his patent and was just sitting on it. (This is
very vague memory - I also seem to remember one of the big oil companies
making the news in this connection. If it wasn't IBM, my apologies to
Big Blue.)
 
--
Dave Mack
cudkeys:
cuddy9 cudencsu cudfnDave cudlnMack cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.09 / Dave Mack /  Re: Coverage of it all (Was Re: The deal)
     
Originally-From: csu@alembic.UUCP (Dave Mack)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Coverage of it all (Was Re: The deal)
Date: 9 Apr 89 17:41:06 GMT
Organization: Alembic Systems

In article <16383@oberon.USC.EDU> chandy@brand.usc.edu (Sundaresan
Chandrashekhar) writes:
 
Do you have any idea what this looks like in an 80-column window? Arrgh!
I've reformatted it to prevent eye burnout.
 
>
>	A lot of scepticism is being openly expressed in the media.
> In the LA times (April 6, Metro section), there was an article by
> a Prof. H.W.Lewis of UC at Santa Barbara, in which he states
> unequivocally that the Utah team did not achieve cold fusion. According
> to him, " The fusion process produces energetic radiation ( that is
> where the energy comes from), and half the time an energetic neutron.
> If the Utah scientists had really produced as much as a watt of power
> through fusion, they would have been bathed in a deadly beam of neutrons
> that fried them to a crisp. ... That they lived to hold their press
> conference is unambiguous proof that they did not produce any noticeable
> amount of power through cold fusion. "
> He goes on to make some rather harsh remarks to the effect that the
> experiments of F&P, and others of the kind, are "distractions [that]
> impair our will to attack the hard jobs".
 
If this is an accurate quote, it's rather amazing. Lewis is calling
Pons and Fleishman not only liars, but inept as well. If doesn't appear as if
Prof. Lewis knows anything at all about nuclear technology - the language
used here is that of the anti-nuclear demagogue, not a scientist.
 
I would be marginally interested in knowing what Prof. H. W. Lewis ( UC
Santa Barbara) is a professor of, if anything. And if it should turn out
to be physics, I wonder whether or not he's working on grants involving
other fusion technologies. The last quoted sentence certainly seems to
indicate a hidden agenda. I can easily imagine how scientists who have
been working on inertial and magnetic confinement since Project Sherwood
might feel about the P&F claims, but issuing a statement like this to
the popular press is extremely unprofessional.
 
--
Dave Mack
cudkeys:
cuddy9 cudencsu cudfnDave cudlnMack cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.09 / Svante Lindahl /  Re: short-term economic impact of cold fusion?
     
Originally-From: zap@front.se (Svante Lindahl)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: short-term economic impact of cold fusion?
Date: 9 Apr 89 21:36:50 GMT
Organization: Front Capital Systems, Stockholm, Sweden

In article <1617@vicom.COM>, lmb@vicom.COM (Larry Blair) writes:
> 	  Btw, what's happening to the price of palladium?
 
Price of Palladium April 7:th was US$168.5/troy ounce in New York
(up from 167.1 the day before) and US$164.25 in London (down from
166.75).
 
Prices before the first reports from Utah were around US$145.
 
Svante.Lindahl@front.se	    (bang-net: ...!uunet!front.se!svante)
			    (non-mx-capable: svante%front.se@uunet.uu.net)
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Steven Bellovin /  Fleischmann/Pons results confirmed!
     
Originally-From: smb@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com (Steven M. Bellovin)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Fleischmann/Pons results confirmed!
Date: 10 Apr 89 00:28:06 GMT
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill

Officials at Texas A&M have announced that researchers there have
reproduced the Fleischmann/Pons experiment.  They've scheduled a
news conference for Monday to discuss the details.
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.09 / Mark Brader /  deuterium harmful?
     
Originally-From: msb@sq.com (Mark Brader)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: deuterium harmful?
Date: 9 Apr 89 23:26:31 GMT
Organization: SoftQuad Inc., Toronto

 
Long ago I read that the first sample of heavy water ever produced was
fed to a mouse or rat, just in case the stuff was poisonous.  The animal
survived.  And certainly rare non-radioactive isotopes of most elements
can be substituted for the usual isotopes without chemical processes
behaving in any substantially different way.
 
But deuterium could be a special case here because it's just about twice
as massive as protium (ordinary hydrogen).  And I do seem to recall
reading *somewhere* that deuterium could actually be poisonous to
people in some way or other.  Anybody know about this?
 
Followups directed to sci.chem.
 
--
Mark Brader, SoftQuad Inc., Toronto, utzoo!sq!msb, msb@sq.com
		"Everything that can be invented has been invented."
		-- Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. patent office, 1899
 
This article is in the public domain.
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------------------------------
1989.04.09 / Ric Helton /  Re: Cold fusion as a terrorist weapon?
     
Originally-From: RCH@cup.portal.com (Ric C Helton)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a terrorist weapon?
Date: 9 Apr 89 14:22:42 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

I think someone has already pointed this out, but there are countless
hundreds of other, more effective and less expensive weapons for the
terrorist groups to use besides cold fusion.  I think some people are
seeing this thing in a glamorous and high-tech light that it doesn't
deserve.  Car batteries are far from elegant.  Just because the process
uses deuterium, people seem to be connecting that with the nuclear
hysteria that has surrounded fission power plants.
 
 -Ric Helton    RCH@cup.portal.com
 -Freestyle BBS 404/546-8256 Athens, GA
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------------------------------
1989.04.09 / Ric Helton /  Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
     
Originally-From: RCH@cup.portal.com (Ric C Helton)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
Date: 9 Apr 89 14:48:23 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

4/7/89 11:34 jerry@olivey.olivetti.com (Jerry Aguirre)
>In article <1134@rpi.edu> ncc1701@pawl.rpi.edu (Mark O. Chadwick) writes:
>> I seem to recall something about a bomber being flown in the late 40's or
>> early 50's that used NUCLEAR power.  It's a good thing that didn't crash,
>> or a mess would certainly have been generated!
>
>Yes, it would be terrible.  Even worse, imagine if they carried nuclear
>BOMBS in airplanes and one of those crashed.  Just think about one or
>more bombs spread out over several square miles! :-)
 
Um... I think bombs have to be armed in order to explode....
Don't they? :-)
 
 -Ric Helton    RCH@cup.portal.com
 -Freestyle BBS 404/546-8256 Athens, GA
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Joe Dellinger /  Re: Heavy Water
     
Originally-From: joe@hanauma.stanford.edu (Joe Dellinger)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Re: Heavy Water
Date: 10 Apr 89 05:46:58 GMT
Organization: Stanford University, Dept. of Geophysics

In article <16868@cup.portal.com> hkhenson@cup.portal.com (H Keith Henson) writes:
>I don't remember where I read it, or even the decade, but biological process
>reject heavy water.
 
I knew a grad student who specialized in studying organic reactions by
replacing H's with D's and seeing how it affected the reaction rate.
Here are two interesting "facts" he told me. Does anyone out there
have more authoritative information?
 
1) D2O is toxic to humans in large enough quantities. A chemist once
murdered his confined-to-bed wife by giving her D2O to drink over a period
of weeks. The guy was supposed to have been caught when his lab launched
an investigation as to where a bunch of their D2O went. (I wish I knew more
details, but that's it.)
 
2) The grad student claimed he could tell
	Ethanol:  H3C-CH2-OH  from
	          DH2C-CH2-OH from
		  H3C-CDH-OH  from
		  H3C-CH2-OD
	by smell!
	But I thought pure Ethanol was supposed to be odorless?
 
Any comments?
\    /\    /\    /\/\/\/\/\/\/\.-.-.-.-.......___________
 \  /  \  /  \  /Dept of Geophysics, Stanford University \/\/\.-.-....___
  \/    \/    \/Joe Dellinger joe@hanauma.stanford.edu  apple!hanauma!joe\/\.-._
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 /  MacLeod /  A modest request for posters.
     
Originally-From: macleod@drivax.UUCP (MacLeod)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: A modest request for posters.
Date: 10 Apr 89 04:48:10 GMT
Organization: Digital Research, Monterey, CA

Please, a moment's attention.
 
The volume of postings is still rising and has gone beyond my ability
to digest.  Others probably feel the same way.
 
Please, if you introduce >new data< or a significantly new >idea< into
a thread, edit the Subject: line.  In the interest of filtering all the
"Wow, what a good idea..." postings, I am KILLing all subject lines
with Re: in them.  This seems drastic, but until the flood moderates it's
my solution.  Other suggestions solicited.
 
Michael Sloan MacLeod  (amdahl!drivax!macleod)
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Tim Maroney /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 10 Apr 89 08:56:31 GMT
Organization: Eclectic Software, San Francisco

Speculation warning.  I both hope and expect that the ideas in this
message will be proven wrong, but they do seem to be worth considering
at this point.
 
Known physical processes can't explain the Pons and Fleischmann results.
As I understand it, there are two major problems:
 
1.	Impossibly high energy yield (about nine orders of magnitude
	above predictions from the fusion model).
 
2.	Unaccountably low neutron production.
 
People are searching for fusion models which provide a complete fit to
the data, but none of them seem to work.  So let's speculate that there
is a "mystery reaction" at work in addition to fusion.  This is a very
uncomfortable thought, because the two anomalies cited above seem to
fit another model:  some sort of subnuclear reaction could be taking
place.  Something like neutron fission might account both for the high
energies and for the low quantities of neutrons.  This subnuclear
mystery reaction might be triggered by the energies released by
tunneling-induced fusion, in much the same way that modern
thermonuclear weapons trigger a fusion reaction using the energies of a
fission reaction.
 
This opens a terrifying prospect of a new generation of weapons with
potential explosive yields in the gigaton range, or even higher.  It
also holds out the strange prospect that this chemistry experiment
might provide a way of testing at least some theories about subnuclear
structures.  Both of these prospects will likely be ruled out by future
research, but for now there seems to be no way to dismiss them out of
hand.
--
Tim Maroney, Consultant, Eclectic Software, sun!hoptoad!tim
"I don't know that atheists should be considered citizens, nor should they
 be considered patriots.  This is one nation under God."
    -- George Bush in FREE INQUIRY magazine, Fall 1988
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Dr Cohen /  Re: Coverage of it all (Was Re: The deal)
     
Originally-From: mmcohen@amos.ling.ucsd.edu (Dr. Michael M. Cohen)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Coverage of it all (Was Re: The deal)
Date: 10 Apr 89 09:01:04 GMT
Organization: Univ. of Calif. - Santa Cruz, Program in Exp. Psychology

In article <3149@alembic.UUCP> csu@alembic.UUCP (Dave Mack) writes:
-If this is an accurate quote, it's rather amazing. Lewis is calling
-Pons and Fleishman not only liars, but inept as well. If doesn't appear as if
-Prof. Lewis knows anything at all about nuclear technology - the language
-used here is that of the anti-nuclear demagogue, not a scientist.
-
-I would be marginally interested in knowing what Prof. H. W. Lewis ( UC
-Santa Barbara) is a professor of, if anything. And if it should turn out
-to be physics, I wonder whether or not he's working on grants involving
-other fusion technologies. The last quoted sentence certainly seems to
 
According to the UC Directory:
LEWIS, Harold W. Professor, Physics, 5125 Broida Hall (SB) 2670,3888
HLEWIS@SBITP.BITNET, HLEWIS@SBPHY.UCSB.EDU
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Paul Dietz /  Cold Fusion
     
Originally-From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Cold Fusion
Date: 10 Apr 89 11:52:50 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

It has been said that the fact the F & P are using 99.5% pure D20
rules out the possibility of ordinary hyrdrogen being involved in the
reaction.  This is not necessarily so.  I believe hydrogen diffuses
more rapidly through palladium than does deuterium.  Therefore, the
the center of the electrode (where the density is presumably the
highest) can be enriched in ordinary hydrogen over the concentration
in the heavy water.
 
My wild guess, then, is that if anything is happening, we're
seeing p+d fusion.  This is ordinarily slow, and makes a gamma
ray to boot.  I speculate, however, that in the palladium lattice
the reaction
	p + d --> 3He
can proceed without gamma emission.  There would be two ways this
might conceivably happen, I speculate.
 
First, the energy could come out as the kinetic energy of a 3He
nucleus, with one (or more) palladium atoms recoiling to conserve
momentum.
 
Second, the reaction might actually be
	p + d + e- --> 3He + e-
with the electron carrying away the energy (although that might make
too much bremmstrahlung).
 
If these speculations are correct, F & P should be making a lot of
helium 3.  1e14 fusions per second for 100 hours will make 60 micromoles
(.18 milligrams) of He3.  Perhaps they should heat an electrode in
vacuum and characterize the gases driven off.
 
	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.08 / Vincent Cate /  call for papers
     
Originally-From: vac@sam.cs.cmu.edu (Vincent Cate)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: call for papers
Date: 8 Apr 89 18:49:48 GMT
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI

As new papers come out on cold fusion I am willing to scan them in and
make them available via FTP if people will FAX them to me.  In particular
I would like to get copies of the following two papers.
 
 
   "Cold Nuclear Fusion: Recent Results and Open Questions."
    Steve Jones of Brigham Young University
 
   "Limits on Cold Fusion in Condensed Matter; a Parametric study"
    J Rafelski and others of Arizona and S.E.  Jones of BYU
 
 
My FAX number is (412) 681-1998
 
 
     -- Vince
 
 
--
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Scott Mueller /  Re: Start of discussion on sci.physics.fusion (was Fusion newgroup)
     
Originally-From: scott@zorch.UU.NET (Scott Hazen Mueller)
Newsgroups: news.groups,sci.physics,alt.fusion,alt.config
Subject: Re: Start of discussion on sci.physics.fusion (was Fusion newgroup)
Date: 10 Apr 89 16:32:25 GMT
Organization: At Home; San Jose, CA

In article <1318@stl.stc.co.uk> "David Wright" <dww@stl.stc.co.uk> writes:
>It seems to me that we have now started the discussion period for creating
>sci.physics.fusion.  Unless the whole thing turns out to be a mistake or
>misunderstood experiment by then, of course.
 
I would prefer on a 'theoretical' basis to go with only alt.fusion until
it becomes more clear whether or not we are really seeing a real phenomenon
here.  However, on a practical basis I am getting a bit stressed out by
the load of trying to subscribe all of the people who are interested in
fusion to the alt.fusion gateway mailing list.  Therefore, I agree with
David that I think that it is time to begin discussing a mainstream fusion
newsgroup.
 
I have deliberately held back from proposing a name for a fusion newsgroup;
while a number of people have weighed in behind sci.physics.fusion, I am
not completely sure that this would be the proper place in the newsgroup
hierarchy.  Certainly, fusion itself is a matter of physics, but much of
the discussion of the topic in alt.fusion has centered about political,
economic and social implications of cheap and relatively clean power.
This makes me a bit unsure that sci.physics.fusion is the right place for
this discussion.  As a counter to my own argument, I will note that
sci.space.shuttle generally does not stick to purely technical concerns.
 
>Volunteer to take the vote?    I will if nobody else wants to, but as
>it wasn't my idea I propose that scott@zorch.uu.net does it if he's willing.
 
Today is the 10th.  On the 24th, at the end of the two week discussion
period,  I will be in Hawaii for my honeymoon, and when I return I will
have comparatively little interest in conduction a vote for at least a
few days.  If there is no problem with starting the vote no earlier
than May 5th, then I will handle it.
--
Scott Hazen Mueller   scott@zorch.UU.NET
(408) 298-6213        (pyramid|tolerant|uunet)!zorch!scott
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Ed Nather /  Re: Fleischmann/Pons results confirmed!
     
Originally-From: nather@ut-emx.UUCP (Ed Nather)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fleischmann/Pons results confirmed!
Date: 10 Apr 89 14:12:05 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <11422@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com>, smb@ulysses.homer.nj.att.co
 (Steven M. Bellovin) writes:
> Officials at Texas A&M have announced that researchers there have
> reproduced the Fleischmann/Pons experiment.  They've scheduled a
> news conference for Monday to discuss the details.
 
An article on the front page of the Austin American Statesman for today (4/10)
has a few details, but not many:
 
1. The announcement said the A&M team "bracketed" the F&P experiment, and
got from 8% to 40% more energy out than they put in.  They do *not* claim
the result demonstrates cold fusion -- apparently they used calorimetric
measurements (only?).
 
2. They quit answering their phone, and ran off to hide on Sunday (yesterday)
to write up their results.  That sounds authentic.
 
3. Lithium was not mentioned in the article.  I'm still betting even money
(up to 10 cents, max) the non-neutron heat-producing reaction is
6Li + 2H -> 2(4He).
 
 
--
Ed Nather
Astronomy Dept, U of Texas @ Austin
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / John Kohl /  Re: Fleischmann/Pons results confirmed by Texas A&M
     
Originally-From: jtkohl@athena.mit.edu (John T Kohl)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fleischmann/Pons results confirmed by Texas A&M
Date: 10 Apr 89 15:50:21 GMT
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology

In article <11894@ut-emx.UUCP> nather@ut-emx.UUCP (Ed Nather) writes:
<In article <11422@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com>, smb@ulysses.homer.nj.att.c
m (Steven M. Bellovin) writes:
<< Officials at Texas A&M have announced that researchers there have
<< reproduced the Fleischmann/Pons experiment.
<
<An article ... [in] the Austin American Statesman (4/10) ... [says]
<
<1. ... They do *not* claim
<the result demonstrates cold fusion -- apparently they used calorimetric
<measurements (only?).
<
 
Even if it's not cold fusion, are the energy gains significant enough to
make this 'tea kettle' commercially viable as an energy source?
 
John Kohl <jtkohl@ATHENA.MIT.EDU> or <jtkohl@Kolvir.Brookline.MA.US>
Digital Equipment Corporation/Project Athena
(The above opinions are MINE.  Don't put my words in somebody else's mouth!)
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Ethan Vishniac /  Re: Cold Fusion
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion
Date: 10 Apr 89 15:36:51 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <1989Apr10.075250.26858@cs.rochester.edu>, dietz@cs.rochester
edu (Paul Dietz) writes:
> My wild guess, then, is that if anything is happening, we're
> seeing p+d fusion.  This is ordinarily slow, and makes a gamma
> ray to boot.  I speculate, however, that in the palladium lattice
> the reaction
> 	p + d --> 3He
> can proceed without gamma emission.  There would be two ways this
> might conceivably happen, I speculate.
>
> First, the energy could come out as the kinetic energy of a 3He
> nucleus, with one (or more) palladium atoms recoiling to conserve
> momentum.
 
This seems contrived, for the same reason that D+D is unlikely.  The
mismatch between phonon energies and gamma rays seems too large.
 
>
> Second, the reaction might actually be
> 	p + d + e- --> 3He + e-
> with the electron carrying away the energy (although that might make
> too much bremmstrahlung).
 
This seems much more promising.  The electron would get stopped after
a short distance in the pd.  The emission might not be a problem.
Presumably the optical depth of Pd to photons in the relevant energy
range is small.  One could examine a used rod for electron/gamma ray tracks.
However, this fails to address the claim by Fleischmann that they detected
anomalous concentrations of He4 (but *not* He3) when analyzing the gases
emitted from the experiment.  Maybe this result is an error.  Maybe it's
just another piece of rumor-mongering.
 
> Perhaps they should heat an electrode in
> vacuum and characterize the gases driven off.
 
They claim, in their paper, that they did something like that (the reference
is vague) but they defer discussion to a later (unwritten) paper.
 
Having convinced myself (through a glance at a suitable reference and a number
of e-mail references) that Li6+D would make a lot of neutrons I can only
say that a 3-body reaction seems necessary.  I like the idea of using
one of the available electrons.  I would still bet on lithium.
I'm still extremely skeptical that any such process would have a high
enough cross section.
 
 
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Curtis Popoff /  Texas A&M duplicates Pons&Fleischmann Fusion
     
Originally-From: curtis@megatek.UUCP (Curtis Popoff)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Texas A&M duplicates Pons&Fleischmann Fusion
Date: 10 Apr 89 13:55:19 GMT
Organization: Megatek Corporation, San Diego, Ca.

 
            "Cold Fusion Experiment Is Reportedly Duplicated"
 
                    From Wall Street Journal
                    Monday, April 10, 1989
 
    Texas A&M University researchers have duplicated a University of Utah
experiment that reportedly achieved nuclear fusion using a relatively simple
process, a spokesman said.
 
    School officials said they would hold a news conference today to announce
that their researchers had achieved the same kind of cold fusion.  "Other
labs around the country have been trying to duplicate this, but nobody else
has been able to get satisfactory results," the Texas A&M spokesman said.
"Our people are convinced that they've got it, so as a gesture to the
reserchers [sic] in Utah we wanted to announce it as soon as possible."
 
    Scientists have long sought the secrets of nuclear fusion, considered a
possible replacement for conventional energy sources because it would be
clean, inexpensive and virtually inexhaustable.  The Utah researchers' March
23 claim that they had achieved fusion at room temperature has been met with
widespread skepticism among colleagues.
 
    Other researchers have complained that they tried to replicated the
experiment of Stanley Pons of the University of Utah and his British
colleague, Martin Fleischmann of the University of Southhampton, but without
success.
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Tom Lane /  Texas A&M confirms cold fusion??
     
Originally-From: tgl@zog.cs.cmu.edu (Tom Lane)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Texas A&M confirms cold fusion??
Date: 10 Apr 89 13:17:25 GMT
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI

National Public Radio reported this morning that researchers at Texas A&M
will hold a press conference today to announce that they have duplicated
the University of Utah fusion experiments.  (Yes, they said UU, not BYU.)
No names were mentioned.  Anybody down there have more details on this?
Have they confirmed the F&P heat measurements??
 
--
				tom lane
Internet: tgl@zog.cs.cmu.edu
UUCP: <your favorite internet/arpanet gateway>!zog.cs.cmu.edu!tgl
BITNET: tgl%zog.cs.cmu.edu@cmuccvma
--
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Peter Desnoyers /  Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
     
Originally-From: desnoyer@Apple.COM (Peter Desnoyers)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
Date: 10 Apr 89 18:31:39 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA

In article <16922@cup.portal.com> RCH@cup.portal.com (Ric C Helton) writes:
>4/7/89 11:34 jerry@olivey.olivetti.com (Jerry Aguirre)
>>In article <1134@rpi.edu> ncc1701@pawl.rpi.edu (Mark O. Chadwick) writes:
   [ stuff about nuclear powered planes ]
>>
>>Yes, it would be terrible.  Even worse, imagine if they carried nuclear
>>BOMBS in airplanes and one of those crashed.  Just think about one or
>>more bombs spread out over several square miles! :-)
>
>Um... I think bombs have to be armed in order to explode....
>Don't they? :-)
>
 
A bomb was accidently dropped over (North? South?) Carolina (I think)
in the 50s. It was not armed, but the TNT exploded and blew a good
sized crater that is quite radioactive.
 
				Peter Desnoyers
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
.
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Paul Dietz /  Fusion Start-Up Company
     
Originally-From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Fusion Start-Up Company
Date: 10 Apr 89 18:27:30 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

If the University of Utah wants to form a start-up company to develop
the fusion discovery, what should they name it?
 
My vote:  UUdyne.
 
	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
 
	No matter where you go, there you are.
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / M Ginsberg /  Summary of Fleischmann talk at CERN (long)
     
Originally-From: ginsberg@polya.Stanford.EDU (Matthew L. Ginsberg)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Summary of Fleischmann talk at CERN (long)
Date: 10 Apr 89 19:57:02 GMT
Organization: Stanford University

 
 
 
                                                           31 March 1989.
              PHYSICS NEWS - COLD FUSION?
 
    Dear E632 and WA84 Colleagues,
 
    There have been many reports in the newspapers that Prof.
    Fleischmann of Southampton and Dr. Pons of Utah have evidence for
    cold fusion of deuterium by electrochemistry. This afternoon Prof.
    Fleischmann gave a seminar in CERN. Because of the many media
    reports, the auditorium was crowded and although I arrived 20
 
    minutes early, I had to sit on the steps. As I have given several
    lectures on Wrong Results in Physics, I went to this and also to
    the press conference afterwards - especially as the news reports
    had been very hard to understand scientifically, but if true, this
    could have a major impact on the world economy.
 
    Martin Fleischmann had a reputation as a major expert in his
    subject. As his talk developed, it became clear that he was a
    first class scientist and it seems to me that he has made a major
    breakthrough, though what the fundamentals processes are is not
    yet fully understood.
 
    Let me try and explain what I think I learnt (I talked to him for
    a while afterwards, so it may not be too bad).
 
    Basically the catalyst used, palladium Pd, is a face-centred
    crystal. It can absorb a certain amount of hydrogen. If an
    electrical potential is applied, then over a period of time it can
    absorb a great deal. For F & P, they reached 0.6 atoms of
 
    deuterium per atom of Palladium after three months.
 
    They made tests with four rods each of 10 cm length and of
    diameters 0.1, 0.2, 0.4 and 0.8 cm. They only have good
    measurements for the first three as one morning when they came in
    they found that the fourth and largest rod had melted and the fume
    cupboard was starting to smoulder! They made calorimetric
    measurements and found that they were getting more heat out than
    they had put in and this effect increased with the diameter of the
    rod. It seems to be a volume effect and not a surface effect. The
    excess heat is about 5 megajoules per cm3 which is about 100 times
    greater than any known chemical process.
 
    A second measurement was by putting a NaI crystal close when they
    recorded gammas. The energy spectrum of the gammas was sharply
    peaked between 2000 and 2400 which is characteristic of the
    (n,gamma) reaction on hydrogen. This could be explained as the
    neutrons interacting in the water bath round the experiment.
 
 
    Thirdly they observed tritium production and measured and found a
    "characteristic" spectrum (I did not understand this fully, partly
    as he had an incomplete scale on the graph, but see later).
 
    Fourthly they looked for neutrons using a polythene sphere filled
    with BF3. The count was three times background. In 50 hours they
    counted 40 000 neutrons. However there is a point that is a
    stumbling block for particle physicists - if you take the rate of
    release of heat, then there should be 10 E 13 or 14 neutrons - a
    huge discrepancy. He does not have the equipment to measure the
    neutron spectrum - the neutrons have to pass through the
    surrounding water bath which tends to thermalise them.
 
    A conclusion that can be drawn from Fleischmann's talk is that the
    heating is not due to the reactions
 
              2D + 2D  ---> 3He + n                               (1)
  	or    2D + 3T  ---> 4He + n                               (2)
 
 
    which are the ones that spring to mind.
 
    He gave a table of the excess enthalpy in the Pd rod cathodes
    expressed as a percentage of breakeven values;
 
                0.1 mm   81%
                0.2     189%
                0.4     839%
 
    From this it can be judged that it was not too surprising that the
    0.8 cm rod melted!
 
    He opened his talk with a basic discussion of electrochemistry.
 
            D2O + e-   <--->  D(absorber) + OD-
 
           D(absorber)  <--->  D(lattice)
 
      D(absorber) + D2O + e-  <--->  D2 + OD-
 
 
    With the applied field the D can go over the potential barrier by
    applying a Potl. Difference at the interface. The result is that
    inside the Pd there can be many collisions without repulsion.
    Effectively there is a PD of 0.8 eV which can translate into a
    compression of 10 E 27 atmos. i.e. it would require this enormous
    pressure to achieve the same PD. Thus electrochemistry is high
    energy chemistry! The D is in a sea of high electron density. The
    structural or coherent strength of the Pd is 4000 atm. Thus it is
    a very strange kind of Quantum Mechanics (his phrase).
 
    I have to go to collect my daughter at the airport, but will try
    and continue later.
 
                                                            1 April 1989.
                                              (despite the date, it is serious!)
    Re-reading what I wrote yesterday. I realise that I have been
    trying to explain simply. The actual talk contained some more
 
    details and two tables of results that I had only time to copy
    down partially. There was a fuller discussion of electrochemistry.
 
    The question now is what is happening. The observations are of a
    source of heat, of emision of tritium, gammas and of neutrons, but
    the number of neutrons are many orders of magnitude less than
    would be expected if the heat produced came from reactions
    producing neutrons. Fleischmann talks as if you have to modify
    quantum mechanics - this I do not believe - we have to apply it
    differently.
 
    An additional piece of information that he gave at his press
    conference but not at his seminar, was that the particle emission
    was not uniform but had fluctuations which were much larger than
    statistical - this I think is a very important piece of
    information.
 
    There are a lot of different theories being discussed. The
    following comments should be considered private, qualitative and
 
    not necessarily correct.
 
    The catalyst, palladium works by accepting an incredible number of
    deuterium nuclei in the spaces of its face-centred cubic lattice.
    The distance between each deuterium nucleus is therefore reduced.
    This was first demonstrated by the observation of muon-induced
    catalysis where in deuterium, the electron is replaced by a muon.
    As the muon is some 200 times heavier, the proton and neutron are
    pulled closer together so that the probability of fusion is
    greatly increased - by many orders of magnitude. Now there are two
    suggestions;
 
    1. Since the deuterium nuclei are in a very dense electron field,
    it may be that the electrons have an effective mass much greater
    than normal and this increases the probabilty of the nuclei
    tunnelling through the barrier.
 
    2. the applied potential difference drives more and more deuterium
    nuclei into the spaces between the palladium atoms so that the
 
    separation of the nuclei decreases so that the probability of
    fusion increases dramatically.
 
    Personally I have a preference for the second approach, but it is
    always possible that both are applicable.
 
    Instead of saying that there is a discrepancy between the number
    of neutrons produced and the heat produced, perhaps we should
    assume that all the results are correct and that the reactions
    ocurring are different. Maybe the dominant reaction is fusion, D +
    D ---> 4He, but we need something else to share the energy and
    momentum produced - this could be the close neighbouring structure
    of the lattice. Thus the dominant reaction is to produce heat! Of
    course other reactions will also occur which is why there is an
    observation of tritium and one would expect some production of 3He
    and 4He and neutrons and gammas. If this were true, and again this
    is mainly a suggestion which needs experimental confirmation, then
    this would have tremendous social effects as we would have a
    simple source of energy without the particulate matter, sulphur
 
    and other gasses from coal and oil fired power stations that are
    killing so many today. Also the radiation danger would be very
    much less than with nuclear reactors ( sell your coal and oil
    shares if you have any!)
 
    In answer to a question, Fleischmann said that they had tried to
    look at 3He and 4He production and ratio, but the experiment is
    difficult for them and they prefer to leave that for experts who
    have the equipment - for they have been using their own money for
    5 years.
 
    Looking again at my notes, I discover that John Ellis had said in
    the discussion that there could be little Coulomb repulsion as
    there could be a classical oscillation of the lattice.
 
    Before the Seminar, things were rather disturbed with the media -
    lots of TV crews and flashes popping off. The Chairman, Carlo,
    asked them all to leave explaining this was a scientific meeting
    and he did not want questions on any other subject, but afterwards
 
    there would be a press conference. After some time the media left.
    At the end of Fleischmann's talk, the TV crews re-entered and had
    to be requested to leave again before the question period.
 
    On the way to the press conference, Fleischmann was told that
    there had been a report on the radio that a group (at Columbia?)
    had confirmed his result. He said he had not heard this and during
    the Press Conference he continued to emphasise, in a very proper
    manner, that before leaping to conclusions, there should be
    further confirming evidence.
 
    Fleischmann had described his other press conference in Utah as
    awful, but this one went well with Carlo a good Chairman - who was
    also asked questions. Fleischmann explained that the work was
    intentional and not an accident. He said that after verification,
    it might take 10 to 20 years to develop an economically viable
    system. Carlo was asked his opinion and said that "Dr. Fleischmann
    has planted a seed - will the seed grow up? I think yes"
    Fleischmann said that he believed in Karl Popper's philosophy -
 
    you cannot prove something right, you can only prove it wrong. "We
    have spent 5 years trying to prove ourselves wrong, now other
    people should try".
 
    In explaining why they did it, "it was not to do an ego trip
    (though all scientists are on an ego trip to some extent), but to
    try and find a plentiful source of energy. We have a social
    conscience"
 
    Question - "There was a sceptical atmosphere in the room, did you
    feel like a chemistry bull in an arena of physics toreadors?"
 
    Answer - "Are people correct to be sceptical?, yes, it is correct
    to be sceptical. But it was not a bad atmosphere. Our experiment
    fits partly into accepted ideas but not entirely, therefore either
    experiment is wrong or we have extended the conceptions of
    possible fusion mechanisms".
 
    Carlo was asked if he found the meeting strange - "No, I am at
 
    home in my own lab".
 
    Question - "Do you think it is correct?". Answer(MF) - "I think it
    is correct, but others should show it is correct". (Note, this was
    typical of some of the questions where the journalist asked "for a
    good quote").
 
    Carlo was asked if CERN should work on fusion. He replied " There
    are different science cultures. In an orchestra everyone tries to
    play his own instrument, and does not have other instruments. But
    we have quantum mechanics in common. We should do what we do best.
    But there is also cross-fertilisation between chemistry and
    nuclear physics" He also joked that this was the first time that a
    chemist had discovered a neutron!
 
    Question - "Any military applications?"
 
    Answer(MF) - "There will always be some military application of
    anything, but we do not know of any such thing"
 
 
    Question - " You said you did not have enough money, have you been
    offered money since your press conference last week"?
 
    Answer - "Up to now have used our own money as we thought it
    unlikely to work, so there were some restrictions. Since then we
    have been approached with offers but as our capacity to spend
    money is limited, we have to plan carefully.
 
    Question - "If it is fusion what will its effect be on other
    fusion research?"
 
    Answer - " Glad you asked that. It would be a total disaster to
    cut back on other fusion research. Ours is small scale, theirs is
    large scale generation of electricity. It would be extremely
    foolish to cut back".
 
    There was more, but I hope this gives the flavour - both
    Fleischmann and Carlo aquitted themselves very well and
 
    responsibly.
 
    Friedrich Dydak had told me he had two papers confirming the F & P
    work and I could copy them. Later when I was returning them,
    Fleischmann came in for another TV interview and we talked while
    he was waiting for the lighting to be set up. He had not seen the
    papers, so I gave him copies. The main author was Stephen Jones
    who is at the BYU in Utah beside Dr. Pons. We looked quickly at
    the papers - he was particularly interested in the dates on the
    papers. I explained I was interested particularly for two reasons.
    Firstly as I was possibly the first to observe fusion in Europe -
    in the early sixties I was scanning bubble chamber film of
    deuterium and normally when there is the decay chain,
 
      pion   --->  muon  --->  electron
 
    the muon always has the same short range (if the pion is at rest).
    But one day I observed an extra long range for the muon. I spent
    some time measuring the curvature and angles of the tracks, but
 
    could not explain it. However someone told me that the Berkeley
    bubble chamber group had found it and it had been explained as the
    muon replacing an electron and causing fusion. At this Luis
    insisted that this should be treated as a secret, but quickly it
    was calculated that it had no military or economical value. So I
    left it and went on to new things(incidently the Scientific
    American article of July 1987 by Rafelski and Jones on Cold
    Nuclear Fusion says that this muon -induced fusion was first
    suggested by Frank and Sakharov in the late 1940's).
 
    Secondly I said I had given several serious lectures on Wrong
    Results in Physics and found that they exhibited certain
    characteristics so that they could be recognised before they had
    been proved wrong - after the press reports I wondered if this was
    a case in point, but after I had heard his conference, I was
    inclined to believe that his results were correct. He did not seem
    to appreciate this too much, not unnaturally, but we continued
    talking and he told me some remarkable things. I mentioned that
    after the press conference, Dr. Wind was looking for him as he
 
    used to work in Utrecht on electrochemistry and had been able to
    insert 1000 hydrogen ions per atom of palladium catalyst. Dr.
    Fleischmann (who had attained 0.6 ions after 3 months) said he did
    not believe this number of 1000. However talking with Per-Olaf
    Hulth this morning, he had checked this subject last night and
    read that 850 ions of hydrogen had been inserted - this could be
    used as hydrogen storage cells for cars driven by hydrogen - air
    mixtures. If I remember rightly, Fleischmann had replied that they
    had not prepared the surface of their palladium rod, and this
    could make a big difference. If it were possible to insert so many
    deuterium ions into palladium, then the rate of fusion would be
    greatly increased (or the charging time would be less than 3
    months).
 
    The two papers are;
 
    1. "Observation of Cold Nuclear Fusion in Condensed Matter" by
    S.E. Jones and others of Brigham Young Univ. and J. Rafelski of
    Univ. of Arizona.
 
 
    2. "Limits on Cold Fusion in Condensed Matter; a Parametric study"
    by J. Rafelski and others of Arizona and S.E. Jones of BYU.
 
    The main point of the first paper is that they claim to have
    observed neutrons when there was low voltage electrolytic fusion
    of deuterons into metallic titanium or palladium. They believe
    this is from the reaction;
 
        d + d  --->  3He(0.82 MeV) + n(2.45 MeV)              (1)
 
    The distribution of counts in different channels give a broad
    enhancement which the authors say corresponds to neutrons of 2.45
    MeV. This looks convincing - just; it would be good to repeat
    this.
 
    They say they have not yet(?!advertising?) obtained results
    regarding the parallel reaction;
 
 
          d + d  ---> p(3.02 MeV)  +  t(1.01 MeV)                  (3)
 
    The electrolyte contains various minmeral salts and they say that
    their evidence indicates the importance of co-deposition of
    deuterons and metal ions at the negative electrode. "hydrogen
    bubbles were observed to form on the Pd foils only after several
    minutes of electrolysis, suggesting the rapid absorbtion of
    deuterons into the foil; oxygen bubbles formed at the anode
    immediately". The palladium pieces were 0.025cm thick and had the
    surfaces roughened or were mossy. They do not say that it took 3
    months to get started by charging the deuterons into the palladium
    (private comment - this suggests to me that Fleischmann and Pons
    would have improved things if they had increased the surface to
    volume ratio of the catalyst and roughened its surface, but it is
    hard to be sure. However it does suggest that it is possible to
    charge the catalyst in much less than three months).
 
    The experimental part of their paper gives an impression of haste,
    but there are a lot of other interesting things in their paper; In
 
    a deuterium molecule the separation between the deuterons is 0.74
    A and the d-d fusion rate is very slow about 10 E -70 per D2
    molecule per sec ( calculated in an interesting paper by Van
    Siclen, C.D. and Jones, S.E., Journal of Physics G Nucl. Phys. 12
    (1986) 213 - here they state that the fusion rates for reactions
    (1) and (3) are nearly equal over the range 10 to 30 KeV. They
    also discuss whether piezonuclear fusion - i.e. by pressure -
    within the liquid metallic hydrogen core of Jupiter could account
    for the fact that the planet radiates 1.5 times as much heat as it
    receives from the sun. However they concluded that this process
    was many orders of magnitude too small to be a significant energy
    source - this is where the idea of Fleischmann and Pons of using
    electrolytic catalysis is so important). However in muon-induced
    catalysis the internuclear separation is reduced by about the
    ratio of the muon to the electron masses (200) resulting in the
    fusion rate increasing by an enormous factor, 80 orders of
    magnitude! In the second paper this variation of fusion rate as a
    function of the distance is quantified. This made me think of the
    observation by Fleischmann that they had observed large
 
    fluctuations in the signals - for the number of deuterons in a
    space in the lattice of Palladium is discrete and given by Poisson
    statistics hence the distance between the deuterons will vary
    appreciably - this and other factors(roughness of surface) could
    cause there to be local spots hot in space and time, since the
    fusion rate varies so violently with distance. In addition to the
    reactions (1) and (3), there can occur the reaction on tritium
    that will exist to some varable extent,
 
            2D + 3T  --->  4He + n                            (2)
 
    Although there is less tritium than deuterium, this reaction has a
    much higher cross section - so that this reaction (2) could also
    help fluctuations (but these comments on fluctations are my own,
    so treat them with appropriate caution).
 
    Paper (1) also has an interesting chapter on Geophysical
    considerations (or the Hawaii effect). Sea water contains about
    one part in 7000 of deuterium. By subduction water is carried down
 
    to the earth's mantle where it might undergo fusion via the
    reaction;
 
                 p + d  --->  3He + gamma(5.4 MeV)          (4)
 
    under the extreme pressure and temperature there. Calculations are
    done which indicate that a substantial contribution to the heat
    flux through the crust could come from cold fusion. This heat
    could also help to explain the localised heat of volcanism at
    subduction zones. They quote that the 3He to 4He ratio is high in
    rocks, liquids and gases from volcanoes. Further they then predict
    that tritium will be produced from d + d fusion and since tritium
    is relatively short-lived(12 years half-life), observation of
    tritium  would suggest a geologically recent process. On the Mauna
    Loa mountain on Hawaii, tritium was monitored from 1971 to 1977
    and a correlation is shown in the paper between the tritium level
    and volcanic activity. This is very striking for the 1972 Mauna
    Ulu eruption but later eruption signals were partly confused by
    atomic bomb tests. They estimate that in the Mauna Ulu eruption
 
    100 curies of tritium was released per day for 30 days!
 
    In paper (1), it is also reported that after diamonds are sliced
    with a laser, the concentration of 4He and 3He has been measured -
    it is reported that the 4He is distributed uniformly while the 3He
    is concentrated in spots suggesting cold fusion reactions. Similar
    anomalies have been reported in metal foils.
 
    The authors also calculate that the excess heat from Jupiter could
    be accounted for from cold fusion in the core consisting of
    metallic hydrogen plus iron silicate.
 
    The second paper calculates the cold fusion rate of d-d as a
    function of
 
        1 - relative energy,
        2 - separation of two hydrogen nuclei in a sphere,
        3 - the effective electron mass,
        4 - the effective electron charge.
 
 
    They do not consider the effects of the lattice of a catalyst as
    do Fleischmann and Pons.
 
    It is probable that some readers will be thinking that this letter
    has wandered off strict physics news. They are right. It is
    intentional as I feel this subject will become so important to
    society that we must consider the broader implications as well as
    the scientific ones. Looking into a cloudy crystal ball, it is not
    impossible to foresee the situation that the experiments are so
    easy that schools will be doing them, that many new companies will
    start up, most(not all) will fail and the present big power
    companies will be running down their oil and coal power stations
    while they are building deuterium separation plants and new power
    plants based on cold fusion. No new nuclear power stations will be
    built except for military needs. There will be very little if any
    research on high temperature(plasma) fusion. Petrol will probably
    still be used for cars. Overall pollution will start to be less.
    Ecologists will be talking about the contamination from
 
    radioactive tritium and asking about the effect of this tritium on
    the ozone layer.
 
    CONCLUSIONS
 
    It is known(from muon cataysis) that if two nuclei of deuterium or
    tritium are held close together, then they can fuse releasing
    energy.
 
    Fleischmann and Pons thought of achieving this by using
    electrolysis to insert deuterium nuclei inside a palladium
    catalyst. They observed production of more heat than they put in.
    They also observed tritium production, gammas of an energy
    consistent with neutrons interacting with the surrounding water
    bath, and neutrons directly. They thus conclude they have observed
    fusion of heavy hydrogen producing energy, i.e. cold fusion. A
    paper by Jones et al. reports on the operation of similar
    electrolytic cells with observation of neutrons with an energy
    spectrum consistent with that expected from deuterium fusion. They
 
    also describe interesting though rather anecdotal evidence for
    fusion in volcanoes, Jupiter, diamonds and metal foils. The
    theory, while not fully developed, suggests that the deuterium
    nuclei inside the lattice of the catalyst, are held so closely
    together that the probability of fusion(the tunneling effect) is
    dramatically increased by many orders of magnitude. it may be
    expected that this will cause major changes in the energy industry
    and major social, economic and hence political changes.
 
                                              Douglas R. O. Morrison.
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Ernst Mulder /  the original papers
     
Originally-From: rcbaem@eutrc3.UUCP (Ernst Mulder)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: the original papers
Date: 10 Apr 89 14:54:07 GMT
Organization: Eindhoven University of Technology, The Netherlands

Can someone send me the orirgnal files directly? The PostScript
versions please. Our FTP program has no connection to
sam.cs.cmu.edu, so I can't get them myself.
 
 MAILING address:    rcbaem@eutrc3.uucp
 
 Thanx.
   Ernst.
     >
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Rene Klomp /  Re: F and P paper via FTP
     
Originally-From: renek@wn2.sci.kun.nl (Rene Klomp)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: F and P paper via FTP
Date: 10 Apr 89 14:07:15 GMT
Organization: University of Nijmegen, The Netherlands.

In article <4670@pt.cs.cmu.edu>, vac@sam.cs.cmu.edu (Vincent Cate) writes:
>
> Again to get your own copy of the paper:
>
> First to get the 16 files using ftp:
>
> [deleted]
>
>   -- Vince
> --
 
Since I'm living in The Netherlands I can't get these 16 files by
anonymous ftp. Could someone please send me them? Thanks.
cudkeys:
cuddy10 cudenrenek cudfnRene cudlnKlomp cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Dave Mack /  Re: Fleischmann/Pons results confirmed!
     
Originally-From: mack@inco.UUCP (Dave Mack)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fleischmann/Pons results confirmed!
Date: 10 Apr 89 20:53:01 GMT
Organization: McDonnell Douglas-INCO, McLean, VA

In article <11894@ut-emx.UUCP> nather@ut-emx.UUCP (Ed Nather) writes:
>In article <11422@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com>, smb@ulysses.homer.nj.att.c
m (Steven M. Bellovin) writes:
>> Officials at Texas A&M have announced that researchers there have
>> reproduced the Fleischmann/Pons experiment.  They've scheduled a
>> news conference for Monday to discuss the details.
>
>An article on the front page of the Austin American Statesman for today (4/10)
>has a few details, but not many:
>
>1. The announcement said the A&M team "bracketed" the F&P experiment, and
>got from 8% to 40% more energy out than they put in.  They do *not* claim
>the result demonstrates cold fusion -- apparently they used calorimetric
>measurements (only?).
 
40% better than breakeven without any optimization? Good God...
 
From memory, several hours ago, the estimates are rough:
 
A CNN broadcast on this showed the apparatus in operation: A liquid-filled
glass vessel about three inches in diameter and five inches deep, with
a squat metal object in the middle. This emitted intermittent flashes of
brilliant light, not unlike an electric arc.
 
One of the most interesting things about the setup was that there didn't
appear to be any radiation shielding around the apparatus. The man
explaining the experiment to the reporters was touching the glass bulb
containing the active elements. None of his bodily parts fell off while
he was on camera (:-).
 
Draw your own conclusions. I'll tape the segment when they rebroadcast
it and try to get a better look at the setup.
 
>3. Lithium was not mentioned in the article.  I'm still betting even money
>(up to 10 cents, max) the non-neutron heat-producing reaction is
>6Li + 2H -> 2(4He).
 
Does anyone else have problems visualizing lithium diffusing into Pd?
Nothing I've seen indicates that lithium is even slightly absorbed
by crystalline Pd.
 
If the reaction is occurring at the electrode surface ( P&F claim a
volume, not surface, effect), and 7Li is not involved in the fusion
reaction, I would expect it to quench the reaction fairly thoroughly:
7Li is about 93% of naturally occurring lithium. If the 6Li *is*
reacting, I don't want to think about what would happen if you used
pure 6Li instead of the natural isotopic mixture.
 
--
Dave Mack
Fifteen years ago, I was a physicist. Now I'm a computer programmer.
Take what I write with the appropriate-sized grain of salt.
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Scott Leadley /  Re: Fusion Start-Up Company
     
Originally-From: leadley@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Scott Leadley)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fusion Start-Up Company
Date: 10 Apr 89 20:55:47 GMT
Organization: University of Rochester

In article <1989Apr10.142730.17575@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester.
du (Paul Dietz) writes:
>If the University of Utah wants to form a start-up company to develop
>the fusion discovery, what should they name it?
>My vote:  UUdyne.
 
	Hey, if we're getting silly, how 'bout University of Utah Clean Power,
Inc.
--
 
					Scott Leadley - leadley@cc.rochester.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Spencer Thomas /  Re: F and P paper via FTP
     
Originally-From: spencer@eecs.umich.edu (Spencer W. Thomas)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: F and P paper via FTP
Date: 10 Apr 89 20:50:47 GMT
Organization: University of Michigan EECS Dept

For those who have a laserwriter IISC (the non-postscript printer), I
have a little program that will read and print these files.  If you
want it, send me e-mail and I'll mail it to you.
 
It should be possible to make this work on an Imagewriter (right now it
assumes 300dpi, but it is a simple change to make it assume 144dpi,
which I think is right for an Imagewriter -- I don't have one, so I
can't test it), too.
 
--
=Spencer (spencer@eecs.umich.edu)
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Steve Maurer /  Is the P&F result a D + D -> HE4 reaction?
     
Originally-From: steve@vicom.COM (Steve Maurer)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Is the P&F result a D + D -> HE4 reaction?
Date: 10 Apr 89 23:28:54 GMT
Organization: Vicom Systems Inc. San Jose, Cal.

 
    Discussing the Pons & Fleischman results with a professional
physicist (who freely admits he's in a different field, and isn't
an expert on the subject), he came up with a completely different
hyphothesis as to why they are getting so much energy for so few
neutrons:
 
    Current observation has found that when deuterium combines, it
generates either HE3 or H3 (tritium), not HE4.    However, this has
ALL been the result of extremely high speed/high energy particle
bashing.   It is not the result of tunnelling.   One way P&F may be
getting all that energy is through a D+D->HE4 reaction, which would
produce a tremendous amount of energy ( approx 23 MeV ) but not a
single neutron.    If even a small percentage of these reactions were
of the HE4 variety, it would do much to explain the seemingly anomalous
data which P&F gathered.
 
    Yes, of course there is quantum mechanics to be considered.  The
HE3 and H3 results are exactly 50/50 probability despite differences
in energy output.   This points to a quantum mechanics "need" in high
speed D+D fusions to carry something off which is incompatible to the
reaction, but if this 'thing' is tied to excess momentum, perhaps a
tunneling fusion would not have the same limitation.
 
							Steve Maurer
							steve@vicom.com
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Ramsey Haddad /  Re: Texas A&M confirms cold fusion??
     
Originally-From: ramsey@polya.Stanford.EDU (Ramsey W. Haddad)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Texas A&M confirms cold fusion??
Date: 10 Apr 89 22:12:04 GMT
Organization: Computer Science Department

In article <4680@pt.cs.cmu.edu> tgl@zog.cs.cmu.edu (Tom Lane) writes:
>National Public Radio reported this morning that researchers at Texas A&M
>will hold a press conference today to announce that they have duplicated
>the University of Utah fusion experiments.  (Yes, they said UU, not BYU.)
>No names were mentioned.  Anybody down there have more details on this?
>Have they confirmed the F&P heat measurements??
 
They have a lower ratio of (energy out/energy in) than P&F, but it is
still greater than 1.  My impression is that the lower figure is
primarily because they decided to announce once the ratio went over 1.
The longer that they allow the reaction run, the less significant the
initial charging energy will be, and the ratio should rise.
 
--
Ramsey W Haddad
cudkeys:
cuddy10 cudenramsey cudfnRamsey cudlnHaddad cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Jeff Martens /  A&M Experiment (was Re: Fusion newgroup proposal)
     
Originally-From: martens@calorie.cis.ohio-state.edu (Jeff Martens)
Newsgroups: misc.headlines,sci.misc,sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: A&M Experiment (was Re: Fusion newgroup proposal)
Date: 10 Apr 89 22:51:31 GMT
Organization: Ohio State University Computer and Information Science

In article <9162@watcgl.waterloo.edu> cslewis@lily.waterloo.edu (Cary Lewis) writes:
 
>Based on the recent A&M annoucements, it sounds like ``cold fusion'' is real,
 
Based on everything I've read, the people at Texas A&M did nothing to
attempt to determine whether their results were due to fusion.
Someone in alt.fusion said they measured caloric output only and
didn't bother with radiation shielding; if this is true, we've still
gotta wait before anyone knows anything.
 
Note that I redirected this away from a couple of inappropriate groups.
 
-=-
-- Jeff (martens@cis.ohio-state.edu)
 
...and on Wall St., the Tao is unchanged in moderate trading...
cudkeys:
cuddy10 cudenmartens cudfnJeff cudlnMartens cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Paul Campbell /  existing cold fusion reactors
     
Originally-From: paul@taniwha.UUCP (Paul Campbell)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: existing cold fusion reactors
Date: 10 Apr 89 22:28:35 GMT
Organization: Taniwha Systems Design, Oakland CA

The BYU group suggest the possibility that much volcanic activity may
actually be powered by DD cold fusion (due to subduction of sea water).
I guess that this means that current geothermal power stations are
actually powered by cold fusion .... I guess nothing's really new :-)
 
	Paul
 
--
 
Paul Campbell, Taniwha Systems Design, Oakland CA ..!mtxinu!taniwha!paul
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Jon Singer /  New idea from Joe Doehler about possible mechanism:
     
Originally-From: jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: New idea from Joe Doehler about possible mechanism:
Date: 11 Apr 89 00:04:24 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc., Cupertino, CA

 
Joe Doehler of Energy Conversion Devices suggests that the
 
D + D -> T + p
 
reaction leads to protons with more than 3MeV energy. It then
turns out that
 
p + p + 3MeV -> pion
 
...and the pion decays to a muon!
 
Presumably there's plenty of D around in the lattice for the
muon to catalyze, and moreover the lattice may focus the muon
and/or the D in such a way as to maximize the interaction.
 
I think that's pretty exciting.
 
      Other items:
 
1) Last week, I posted a copy of the Douglas Morrison report from
CERN. 2 (or so) days later, Narayan S Raja posted a copy of the Douglas
Morrison report from CERN. Today, Matt Ginsberg posted a copy of the
Douglas Morrison report from CERN. (Matt's a buddy of mine from a while
back.)
 
Uhh, do we really need THREE copies of the thing?
 
How do we decide which copies get removed, if any? (After all, it may
not do any particular harm to have 3 of them around.)
 
2) Last week, Jef Poskanzer posted a note that mentioned BYU and UU
as having gotten the same neutron rate. I counterposted, citing places
in the papers where they make radically different claims.
 
Well, yesterday, I was looking through the Pons & Fleischman paper yet
again, and found a place where they said their count was 3 times the
background. I think that may be where the confusion is coming from.
 
Remember that the UU group calculated that their detector only catches
1 in 10^4 of the neutrons around, and that it further suffers a factor
of 100 decrease in counting efficiency because of lousy geometry.
 
I'm still concerned - if the fundamental counting efficiencies are
radically different (which seems likely), then UU should still be
seeing MUCH more than 3x background.
 
Can anyone help me understand this? I am sorta caught in cognitive
dissonance here.
 
3) You know, if someone asked me to duplicate the Pons & Fleischman
results (NOT their experimental conditions), I would take three 15mm
spheres of 90% Pd and 10% Ti; I'd put each one in an electrolysis cell
that let me collect the gases that came off the electrodes; I'd use
99.9% D20 instead of 99.5% D2O in one version; I'd add some DTO to one
version, and I'd try my level best to do good calorimetry, and so on.
Anybody willing to comment on experimental method here? (Not, I mean,
on my suggestions in this paragraph, but in general.)
 
4) Also last week, I posted a snotty little joke about fusion.
Unfortunately, I posted it to rec.humor.funny as well as this group.
That means that it has to go through the moderator. I am about to
post it directly. If the moderated version does show up, I will
do my level best to withdraw the posting I'm about to make. (This
presumes that the moderated version has not just shown up. I finished
a scan of this group about 5 minutes back.)
 
 
Cheers!
jon singer
 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jon Singer is (feel free	|
to fill in the blank any way	|	Trigons! I must have trigons!
you wish to, ok?), and		|	Igor, find a trigon shop for me!
is also jon@Apple.COM		|
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Paul Dietz /  Fusion Experiment Replication
     
Originally-From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Fusion Experiment Replication
Date: 11 Apr 89 14:29:46 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

The Wall Street Journal and the New York Times have reports
today on the duplication of the P & F experiment at Texas A&M
and Georgia Tech.
 
The Texas A&M researchers measured excess heat produced in a 1 mm by 5
cm palladium rod.  By a simple calorimetric technique, they found that
the rod produced up to 80% more energy in the form of heat than was
supplied to it as electricity.  I believe the flashing that was
visible in the TV spots was the electrolytic gases being recombined in
the cell.  The heavy water was at 34 C.  The experiment began
producing excess heat 20 minutes after it was turned on, and has been
operating for three days (maybe more, now).
 
At Georgia Tech, researchers report detecting neutrons from their
experiment.  They said they have found a way of treating the Pd so
that neutron emission begins almost immediately (some way of poisoning
the cathode, I speculate).  They took background measurements with the
current off.  The signal when the cell was on, 600 counts per hour,
was 13 times the background.
 
	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Ed Nather /  Re: Cold Fusion
     
Originally-From: nather@ut-emx.UUCP (Ed Nather)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion
Date: 11 Apr 89 15:42:39 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <11900@ut-emx.UUCP>, ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
> However, this fails to address the claim by Fleischmann that they detected
> anomalous concentrations of He4 (but *not* He3) when analyzing the gases
> emitted from the experiment.  Maybe this result is an error.  Maybe it's
> just another piece of rumor-mongering.
>
Or maybe it's right.
 
> Having convinced myself (through a glance at a suitable reference and a number
> of e-mail references) that Li6+D would make a lot of neutrons [...]
 
How did you manage that?  If we count nucleons, we find that Lithium has 6,
Deuterium 2, and the product (2 He4) has 8.  How can you get neutrons out of
that reaction?  Of course, if the product is He3 you'd have a neutron left
over ...
 
 
--
Ed Nather
Astronomy Dept, U of Texas @ Austin
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Carole Ashmore /  Re: cold fusion, control experiment
     
Originally-From: carole@rosevax.Rosemount.COM (Carole Ashmore)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: cold fusion, control experiment
Date: 11 Apr 89 16:12:52 GMT
Organization: Rosemount Inc., Eden Prairie, MN

In article <1989Apr10.201959.7775@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
>In article <11803@ut-emx.UUCP> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
>>Given that deuterium is twice as heavy as ordinary hydrogen it doesn't
>>seem inconceivable to me that its weight could affect its chemistry
>>(e.g. its behavior when dissolved in pd)...
>
>Deuterium does show very slightly different chemistry than protium (the
>pedantic term for ordinary hydrogen), but it's mostly just a matter of
>slightly slower reaction rates.
>--
 
 
Slightly slower reaction rates can be critical in some chemical
processes, biochemical ones for instance.  Feed heavy water to your
lab animals and they will gradually (as the percentage of heavy
hydrogen in their body chemistry increases) become sterile, and then
their fur will fall out, and then their tails will fall off (Honest,
the article said "necrosis of the tail".) and finally they will die.
I read about it many years ago in "Rat Abuse Weekly" or some other
journal of biochemistry.
 
 
 
 
					Carole Ashmore
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Ethan Vishniac /  Re: Cold Fusion
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion
Date: 11 Apr 89 16:47:10 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <11925@ut-emx.UUCP>, nather@ut-emx.UUCP (Ed Nather) writes:
>
I wrote:
> > Having convinced myself (through a glance at a suitable reference and a number
> > of e-mail references) that Li6+D would make a lot of neutrons [...]
>
> How did you manage that?  If we count nucleons, we find that Lithium has 6,
> Deuterium 2, and the product (2 He4) has 8.  How can you get neutrons out of
> that reaction?  Of course, if the product is He3 you'd have a neutron left
> over ...
 
I have a table in my office of reactions that make Be8 and some competing
channels.  It seems to indicate that Li6+D has an excellent chance, at
all energies, of going into Li7+n.  There may be some room for some peculiar
suppresion of this channel, but I'm not enough of a nuclear physicist to
see how that would occur.
 
I suppose I could have just walked down the hall with this, but I figure
it's of general interest.
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / John Logajan /  The tone of fusion experts -- changing?
     
Originally-From: logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: The tone of fusion experts -- changing?
Date: 11 Apr 89 16:47:58 GMT
Organization: Network Systems Corp. Mpls MN

 
Now that Texas A+M has duplicated UofU's energy gain -- look to see less
reporting of negative results without explanation.  Now if people fail
to get results, they will hesitate to report it, since it might be an
admission that they aren't very good at doing experiments.  They will feel
compelled to explain why they got negative results.
 
Plus, with A+M's (and hopefully a few more in the future) duplication, look
for the emphasis to swing to being the first to explain the energy gain --
be it chemical or nuclear.
 
Expect that any "chemical" explanation will immediately be accepted by about
80% of the "experts" -- whether or not the chemical explanation is well
founded, or ultimately true.
 
So the next battle will be the neo-chemists versus the radical-physicists.
This battle will start immediately after the very first "chemical" explanation
is announced.
 
No charge for the above predictions.
 
--
- John M. Logajan @ Network Systems; 7600 Boone Ave; Brooklyn Park, MN 55428  -
- ...rutgers!umn-cs!ns!logajan / logajan@ns.network.com / john@logajan.mn.org -
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / John Nagle /  Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
     
Originally-From: jbn@glacier.STANFORD.EDU (John B. Nagle)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
Date: 11 Apr 89 19:13:33 GMT
Organization: Stanford University

 
      It's still not clear if the heat energy produced stems from a
chemical or nuclear process.  It's possible that low-level neutron
flux comes from fusion but the heat comes from a chemical reaction.
The question, of course, is how long the heat output can be maintained.
 
      But it is good to know that the heat is real.  This is at least
an interesting battery.
 
					John Nagle
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Lawrence Foard /  Re: Neutron counts
     
Originally-From: lfoard@wpi.wpi.edu (Lawrence C Foard)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Neutron counts
Date: 11 Apr 89 18:11:22 GMT
Organization: Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, MA. USA

 
In article <1989Apr10.202658.7980@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
>In article <1989Apr9.192631.26064@sq.com> msb@sq.com (Mark Brader) writes:
>..
>your gyros but good.  Alcohol does the same thing in reverse -- it's
>lighter than water -- which is why large doses of alcohol make you sick.
>(And yes, in animal experiments -- the doses of alcohol are high enough
>to be somewhat dangerous -- the right mixture of the two cancels the
>effect by balancing the density differences.)
>--
>Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
>passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
 
What if you replace enough of the H in alcohol with D to make it the
same weight as water (can you??). Then you could get drunk without getting
sick and you could use it as fusion fuel or as gasahol (sp?) for your car.
Everything any one could ever want in a drink :)
 
On the idea of the earth being heated by fusion does any one know if the core
of Mars suddenly cooled down after it lost its water? The thoery would seem to
suggest that hydrogen less planets will have not molten cores, and hydrogen
rich ones will have hotter cores and plate activity.
 
A good science fiction story:
 Make a big drop (24 thousand miles across) of Heavy water, put some life on
it and drop a big chunk of palladium in, The inside of the planet should have
a nice blue glow, then send it out into intergalactic space. Self heating and
lighting planet.
 
Or:
 Life that has evolved to use cold fusion, and eventually moves out into
interstellar space munching up gas and dust as it finds it.
 
--
Disclaimer: My school does not share my views about FORTRAN.
            FORTRAN does not share my views about my school.
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Tim Maroney /  Georgia Institute of Technology Partially Replicates P & F
     
Originally-From: tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Georgia Institute of Technology Partially Replicates P & F
Date: 11 Apr 89 18:33:32 GMT
Organization: Eclectic Software, San Francisco

According to a story in the New York Times, both Texas A&M and the
Georgia Institute of Technology claim to have replicated parts of the
Pons and Fleischmann experiment.  While the Texas A&M reports have been
widely disseminated (and so won't be repeated here), no mentions of the
Georgia Tech experiment have appeared in this group yet.
 
In a sort of obverse of the Texas A&M research, GIT investigators
claimed to have detected fusion neutrons, but they did not know how
much energy had been produced.  "Dr. James Mahaffey, leader of the
Georgia Tech group [said that there was] an increase of thirteenfold in
the flow of neutrons emitted from the test cell when the current was
switched on."
 
This seems possibly more significant than the purely calorimetric
studies at Texas A&M, since those studies did not rule out the
possibility of some unknown chemical reaction.  We are still waiting
for someone to reproduce the entire experiment.  However, the idea does
seem to have been given a boost.
 
(On an unrelated topic, can anyone tell me why the decay of a neutron
into a proton and electron would require rewriting quantum physics?  I
was under the impression it was a known decay reaction.  I don't know
whether it releases or requires energy, though.  [Oh, all right: "I
don't know if it's exothermic or endothermic".  You write so people can
understand you and instead they assume you don't know anything.])
--
Tim Maroney, Consultant, Eclectic Software, sun!hoptoad!tim
 "Those Mayas were sacrificing not only pagan children, but baptized
 Christian children, for crying out loud!  And they were carrying out
 those sacrifices, those barbarities, with great savagery, without
 giving the victims the benefit of the humane types of death that the
 European Church accorded even to heretics and witches during that
 century, such as burning at the stake."
		-- Matthew Rosenblatt, rec.arts.books
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Rocket Squirrel /  Rampant speculation and betting pool
     
Originally-From: mark@spot.megatek.uucp (Rocket J. Squirrel)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Rampant speculation and betting pool
Date: 11 Apr 89 17:44:24 GMT
Organization: Megatek Corporation, San Diego, Ca.

Ok campers, so it appears that there is SOME way, whatever the mechanism
turns out to be, to extract heat energy from seawater. It seems clear to
me that the first major use of this will be to replace nuclear and coal
fired electrical plants.
 
So who wants to speculate on which big industrial concern will be the first
to sell a commercial, ready to operate, fusion reactor to your friendly
local electrical company? GE? General Atomic? Westinghouse? Somebody in
France or Japan? Someone we have never heard of yet?
 
If you chose to speculate, please state *WHY* do you chose the company
you do. Remember, there may be a major long term investment windfall in
picking the right company now.
 
-mark
 
--
ucsd.edu!megatek!mark					mark thompson
	"Tiger mutters the fighter pilot's prayer: `Oh shit.'"
--
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / M Polinske /  Text copy of F&P paper
     
Originally-From: mcp2@csd4.milw.wisc.edu (Michael C Polinske)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Text copy of F&P paper
Date: 11 Apr 89 19:23:34 GMT

Has anyone got a text version of the Fleischmann and Pons paper yet.
I am interested in reading this document, but alas, no printers on our
campus are capable of printing postscript files.
 
Could some kind soul please send me a text/*roff/*TeX version of the
paper or post it to the net.
 
Thanks in advance
--
 ________________________________________________________________________
/ _ _ _                    _      __      _ __     _                     \
|' ) ) )      /           //     /  )    ' )  )   //              /      |
| / / / o _. /_  __.  _  //     /         /--' __|/  o ____  _   /_  _   |
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Wm Davidsen /  Re: Media cover of cold fusion (was Re: The deal)
     
Originally-From: davidsen@steinmetz.ge.com (Wm. E. Davidsen Jr)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Media cover of cold fusion (was Re: The deal)
Date: 11 Apr 89 19:34:26 GMT
Organization: General Electric CRD, Schenectady, NY

In article <833@umecs.cs.umu.se> eao@umecs.cs.umu.se (Erik Marklund TDB) writes:
|
| 	A swedish engineer patended a method for producing helium from
| 	hydrogen with Palladium back in 1926 (nineteenhundredtwentiesix).
 
  I got a note from someone else about this, and they said the process
had never been a commercial success because it generated too much heat.
Can someone with access to Swedish patent files check this? If true, it
would be a great joke (if you like irony).
--
	bill davidsen		(wedu@crd.GE.COM)
  {uunet | philabs}!steinmetz!crdos1!davidsen
"Stupidity, like virtue, is its own reward" -me
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Jon Singer /  Backwoods fun!
     
Originally-From: jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Backwoods fun!
Date: 11 Apr 89 00:13:40 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc., Cupertino, CA

 
(By Jon Singer and Michael Butler)
 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
(taken from Pyro Joe's Hot Flashes, pp 137-151)
 
Now, kids, it's tahm ta talk about dee-layed gratification.
 
....
 
Here's one that'll tickle ya pink! (Also black & blue if ya
stand around it too long. Take a hint from ol' Joe.)
 
How menny	Whut is it			Where d'ya git it
___________________________________________________________________________
    1      1 inch cube of 90% Palladium		any good hardware store
		with 10% Titanium		should have it, or
						spesh'l order frum Sears
 
    1	   4 inch length of gold wahr		steal from yore sister's
						earrin's
 
   5 gallons    heavy water, with 10%		steal frum Navy base
		DTO (th' "Jolt" version,	or borry frum naybors.
		heh heh.)
 
    1 cup  Lithium Lye, with Deuterium,		war surplus store
	   USGummint #3039924057394XD
 
    1	   1 to 3 volt, 30 amp pahr splah	hell, bild it, use
						pappy's arc welder,
						or whutever.
 
    1      special currint reggalater		bild it.
	   (figger 3, end of chapter)
 
    1	   Kickass(tm) 8 week high-reliability	Shoot, ain't you got a
		timer or equiv'lint		hardware bin? Call up
						Bud's Scientific Splah.
						Don't let on whut it's
						fer.
 
    1	   big moonshahn crock, with lid.	c'mon, ya gotta know
						where ta git basics!
 
   th' usual wahr an' stuff, as requahred.
 
 
How d'ya do it, Joe?
_____________________
 
Wal, ya find a ol' shack on a hill somewheres that still got pahr
goin' to it.  (Elsewise, ya gots ta use a whole lotta ol' truck
batt'ries, which is tuff ta hump around.) Put th' crock in th' shack,
and pour th' Jolt water inta it.  Stir in th' Lithium Lye, slow an'
keerful-lahk. Don't splash none, an' don't add th' stuff too quick,
now.  Cover it real taht, so's ya don't lose too much. Y'all don't
wanna hafta sneak inta th' navybase again, do ya? Them guys got guns &
stuff and they ain't afraid ta use it.
 
So, ennyway, see, ya bild the pahr splah, an' ya bild th' currint
reggalater in figger 3 at th' end of th' chapter, the one with the
special shunt cirkit fer changin' the currint. Thet's whar th'
Kickass tahmer goes. Test it ta be sure that th' current starts at
about 30 amps and goes down ta 10 or 15 when th' tahmer goes off.
 
Bild th' other stuff lahk in figger 2. Cart th' whole mess down ta th'
shack, and put th' "Bidness end" inter the Jolt water. Don't leave th'
lid off too long, now. Cover it up good, an' duck tape it, specially
th' place wher the wahrs come out. Ah got me some motorcycle ground
strap, which is read'ly avail'ble an' flat, so it don't queer up the
fit o' the lid. Bolt the straps down real secure, an' put vaseline on
th' bolts.
 
Now, set th' Kickass tahmer fer 8 weeks, plug th' pahr splah in,
make sure ya got 30 amps, an' take a hike.
 
'Member, nootrons ain't yer frens. Keep ol' Blue away from th' shack
unless ya want two-headed puppies runnin' around eatin' too much,
probly worrit yore momma no end, an' if ya gotta go in ther ta check,
don't stay long. Ya want ol' Joe's advice, after around 7 weeks, don't
go in ther atall.
 
This hear makes a real `hot flash', an' in fact, it's whut this book
is named fer. Y'all kin see th' flash from a couple mahls away, raht
through th' av'ridge wall, so don't go bildin' it in yer basemit. Got
thet?  No need ta keep it too close ta home, raht? Ya kin get caught
with it if it's too close. Besides, ya don't want yer sister fahndin'
out wher her earrin's got off ta. She probly woont lahk it, an' she'll
make ya cut her in on the deal. 'Course, thet maht not be too bad, if
she's good with a soldrin' ahrn. Probly bilds good pahr splahs, an
that's importunt ta this 'hot flash'.
 
Ah got trouble, Joe. Now whut?
______________________________
 
 
Whut happen		Whut ta do
___________________________________________________________________________
y' hair fall out	Dummy! I tol' ya not ta stan' aroun' up
in hanks		close-lahk! Thow away yer clothin', an'
			take lots o' shahrs. Eat some vitamin E,
			an' call th' doc ef'n it don't stop in
			a spell.
 
red skin &		same thing.
funny spots,
bruise too easy
 
juice won't drop to	shunt circuit screwed up, or ya bought a cheap
10-15 amps		tahmer. Don't bah you no cheap tahmers!
 
no flash after 8	th' Authority mebbe cut yer pahr. Wait 2 more
weeks is gone bah	weeks an' then check fer pahr at the wall sockit.
			Ef thet don't work, check the pahr splah. Ah
			tol' ya yer sister probly bild it better then
			you, ya shoulda listened. Also check th'
			tahmer. 'Member whut ah sed about cheap ones!
 
Big wet spot		y' crock leak? If no leaks, check the roof. If
			the roof leaks, don't worrit yerself. If th'
			crock leaks, fix it quick.
 
'lectrode turns brown	probly yer Lithium Lye is contaminatid. Ya can
			give it up, or start over.
 
runs hot		only happins once in a whahl. Swipe Grampa's
			ol' still-tubin', an' make lahk a li'l still
			coil with it. Jes' run th' outlet back inta
			the crock. Duck tape the whole mess real good.
			If thet ain't enuf, use a truck radiater.
			Don't drink the stuff, neither! Taste lahk
			hell, take it from one that knows.
 
 
Youall have fun, now. Ef ya hit the sweet spot, th' hill will glow fer
munths. Thet means you done real good! Set up a "myst'ry spot" sahn,
an' charge th' city folks a dollar a look.
 
Yore Frend,
Joe
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jon Singer is (feel free	|
to fill in the blank any way	|	Trigons! I must have trigons!
you wish to, ok?), and		|	Igor, find a trigon shop for me!
is also jon@Apple.COM		|
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenjon cudfnJon cudlnSinger cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszL cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Henry Spencer /  Re: cold fusion, control experiment
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: cold fusion, control experiment
Date: 10 Apr 89 20:19:59 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <11803@ut-emx.UUCP> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
>Given that deuterium is twice as heavy as ordinary hydrogen it doesn't
>seem inconceivable to me that its weight could affect its chemistry
>(e.g. its behavior when dissolved in pd)...
 
Deuterium does show very slightly different chemistry than protium (the
pedantic term for ordinary hydrogen), but it's mostly just a matter of
slightly slower reaction rates.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy10 cudenhenry cudfnHenry cudlnSpencer cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Henry Spencer /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 10 Apr 89 20:21:18 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <11789@ut-emx.UUCP> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
>But the real killer is that the only North American source of any size
>is in *Canada*!  Next thing you know they'll be asking us to accept
>that funny-looking money of theirs. :-)
 
Nah, we'll take that drab green stuff of yours, in adequate quantities of
course.  Special just for you, palladium at only $1000/ounce.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy10 cudenhenry cudfnHenry cudlnSpencer cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Henry Spencer /  Re: fusion- synthesize petroleum
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: fusion- synthesize petroleum
Date: 10 Apr 89 20:22:15 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <7974@mtune.ATT.COM> dwp@mtune.ATT.COM (David Preisler) writes:
>All we need to do is extract H from water [ using our cheap inexhaustable
>power supply ], and then  synthesize it into anything we need: methane,
>octane, plastics, house paint, or whatever.
 
Um, not easy, that.  Higher-hydrocarbon synthesis is particularly painful.
If energy were cheap enough it could undoubtedly be done, though.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy10 cudenhenry cudfnHenry cudlnSpencer cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Henry Spencer /  Re: deuterium harmful?
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Re: deuterium harmful?
Date: 10 Apr 89 20:26:58 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <1989Apr9.192631.26064@sq.com> msb@sq.com (Mark Brader) writes:
>... I do seem to recall
>reading *somewhere* that deuterium could actually be poisonous to
>people in some way or other.  Anybody know about this?
 
Heavy water will make you sick, for non-chemical reasons, but I don't
think it will kill you -- at least, I haven't heard of it doing so.
 
The reason heavy water makes you sick is that the heavy water in your
bloodstream starts diffusing into the fluid in your semicircular canals
from only one point, creating a "heavy spot" in the fluid and scrambling
your gyros but good.  Alcohol does the same thing in reverse -- it's
lighter than water -- which is why large doses of alcohol make you sick.
(And yes, in animal experiments -- the doses of alcohol are high enough
to be somewhat dangerous -- the right mixture of the two cancels the
effect by balancing the density differences.)
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy10 cudenhenry cudfnHenry cudlnSpencer cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Liana Becker /  F. and Pons paper
     
Originally-From: liana@yetti.UUCP (Liana Becker)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: F. and Pons paper
Date: 10 Apr 89 18:15:30 GMT
Organization: York U. Computer Science

If anybody has succeeded in getting the paper I would very much like a copy of
it sent to me.  For some reason I haven't been able to pull it off the system.
 
Thanks,  Liana
 
cudkeys:
cuddy10 cudenliana cudfnLiana cudlnBecker cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Jon Singer /  Re: deuterium harmful?
     
Originally-From: jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Re: deuterium harmful?
Date: 11 Apr 89 00:37:22 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc., Cupertino, CA

 
I hope this is humorous. I do, I do. (That is, I hope that Henry is
_not_ claiming that heavy water ain't poisonous.) Sounds like a cute
item, though, disturbing your sense of balance. A little unfamiliar,
though, to be sure. I have never heard that explanation for ethanol
effects.
 
Heavy water is indeed, as far as I know, poisonous. Just that it isn't
like, say, cyanide or anything like that. My understanding is that you
have to drink about a pint before you start getting symptoms, and it
may well be that the ones Henry mentions are the first ones you get. I
dunno. I do seem to recall, though, that if you get enough Deuterium
into you, seriously bad things happen.
 
Cheers!
jon singer
 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jon Singer is (feel free	|
to fill in the blank any way	|	Trigons! I must have trigons!
you wish to, ok?), and		|	Igor, find a trigon shop for me!
is also jon@Apple.COM		|
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenjon cudfnJon cudlnSinger cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Brett Glass /  Fusion Company Names
     
Originally-From: glass@anableps.berkeley.edu (Brett Glass)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Fusion Company Names
Date: 11 Apr 89 01:17:41 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley

In article <1989Apr10.142730.17575@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester.edu
 (Paul Dietz) writes:
 
>If the University of Utah wants to form a start-up company to develop
>the fusion discovery, what should they name it?
 
>My vote:  UUdyne.
 
Mine: Consolidated Fusion. (Think about it.... ;-)
 
<BG>
============================================================================
"One of the nicest things about mathematics, or anything else you might
 care to learn, is that many of the things which can never be, often are."
                                      Norton Juster, "The Phantom Tollbooth"
============================================================================
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Dennis Thurlow /  Re: F and P paper via FTP
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: F and P paper via FTP
Date: 10 Apr 89 21:43:41 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC  S. Plainfield, NJ

In article <4670@pt.cs.cmu.edu> vac@sam.cs.cmu.edu (Vincent Cate) writes:
>
>Again to get your own copy of the paper:
>
>First to get the 16 files using ftp:
>
>    ftp sam.cs.cmu.edu
>    anonymous
>    anonymous
Please! Some of us are out at the end of uucp connections! Any way
to get a copy out here in the boonies?
nsscb!det
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Randell Jesup /  Re: Asteroids and Pd fusion
     
Originally-From: jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.space,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Asteroids and Pd fusion
Date: 10 Apr 89 21:25:22 GMT
Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA

In article <1989Apr8.212905.131@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
>In article <10346@nsc.nsc.com> andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew) writes:
>>... The existence of a heatsink at 3 degK should be a great help for
>>the engine design...
>
>Not as much as you think.  Getting the heat out to that heatsink is
>*not* a trivial problem.  The shuttle uses the entire inner surface of
>its payload-bay doors as a heat radiator.  If you look at pictures of
>the space station, you'll see two sets of big flat panels sticking
>out -- solar panels, and radiators.  Fusion rockets are likely to have
>quite serious cooling problems, at least in high-performance versions.
>(Chemical rockets dump heat into their fuel, but a high-performance
>fusion rocket doesn't use fuel quickly enough for that approach to work.)
 
	There's a bit of confusion here (especially in the original
message).
 
	First, the fuel (for energy) is deuterium.  Second, the fuel (in
terms of reaction mass) is fairly arbitrary.  Hydrogen isn't bad, but it's
pretty light.  Mercury (as in ion engines) is nice and heavy, makes for
good specific impulse for an electric engine.  In addition, given minimal
mining ability, mass from the asteroid can be used if need be.
 
	Second, while not 3 deg K, the asteroids mass might make a nice,
convenient heat sink.  Also, its surface makes a nice place to put radiators.
 
	Third, so long as you don't care how fast the asteroid get to you,
you can use an arbitrarily small amount of palladium for the fusion reactor.
Remember, the fuel is the deuterium.  So what if it takes a few centuries? :-)
The real question is to figure out how many watts can be produced/cc (F&P
results may not be indicative of what is possible, especially with D-T or
T-T fusion, but they get 26w/cc); and then figure out the efficiency of your
heat engine and specific impulse of your fuel, etc; and then figure out how
long it takes to produce the delta-v.
 
	Of course, I'm no rocket scientist.  :-)
 
--
Randell Jesup, Commodore Engineering {uunet|rutgers|allegra}!cbmvax!jesup
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Randell Jesup /  Re: Heavy Water
     
Originally-From: jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Re: Heavy Water
Date: 10 Apr 89 21:38:22 GMT
Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA

In article <1414@Portia.Stanford.EDU> joe@hanauma.stanford.edu (Joe Dellinger) writes:
>I knew a grad student who specialized in studying organic reactions by
>replacing H's with D's and seeing how it affected the reaction rate.
...
>1) D2O is toxic to humans in large enough quantities. A chemist once
>murdered his confined-to-bed wife by giving her D2O to drink over a period
>of weeks. The guy was supposed to have been caught when his lab launched
>an investigation as to where a bunch of their D2O went. (I wish I knew more
>details, but that's it.)
 
	Sounds like a typical "urban legend".
 
>2) The grad student claimed he could tell
>	Ethanol:  H3C-CH2-OH  from
>	          DH2C-CH2-OH from
>		  H3C-CDH-OH  from
>		  H3C-CH2-OD
>	by smell!
 
	_Rather_ unlikely.  I want to see a control....
 
--
Randell Jesup, Commodore Engineering {uunet|rutgers|allegra}!cbmvax!jesup
cudkeys:
cuddy10 cudenjesup cudfnRandell cudlnJesup cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.10 / Tim McDaniel /  Re: deuterium harmful?
     
Originally-From: mcdaniel@uicsrd.csrd.uiuc.edu (Tim McDaniel)
Newsgroups: sci.chem,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: deuterium harmful?
Date: 10 Apr 89 23:22:05 GMT
Organization: Center for Supercomputing R&D (Cedar), U. of Ill.

Note: this article is almost totally irrelevant to sci.chem and
alt.fusion.  Well, it has a bit of relevance, since it deals with
invention.  I post it because the original appears in an article, and
I like to debunk.  :-) Hit "n" (or "j" or whatever) if you don't want
to see it.
 
In article <1989Apr9.192631.26064@sq.com> msb@sq.com (Mark Brader) writes:
>Mark Brader, SoftQuad Inc., Toronto, utzoo!sq!msb, msb@sq.com
>		"Everything that can be invented has been invented."
>		-- Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. patent office, 1899
>This article is in the public domain.
 
See "A Patently False Patent Myth", by Samuel Sass, in "The Skeptical
Inquirer", Vol. 13, No. 3, Spring 1989, p. 310-312.  Excepts follow.
(Samuel Sass may be contacted at 523 Crane Ave., Pittsfield, MA 12001.)
 
"For more than a century there has periodically appeared in print the
story about an official of the U. S. Patent Office who resigned his
post because he believed that all possible inventions had already been
invented.  Some years ago, before I retired as librarian of a General
Electric Company division, I was asked by a skeptical scientist to
find out what there was to this recurring tale."
 
It had been investigated by Dr. Eber Jeffery, for the D.C. Historical
Records Survey under the Works Projects Administration; his findings
were published in the July 1940 "Journal of the Patent Office
Society".  "Jeffery found no evidence" of any such resignation, but
"may have found a clue to the origin of the myth".
 
"In his 1843 report to Congress, the then commissioner of the Patent
Office, Henry L. Ellsworth, included the following comment: 'The
advancement of the arts, from year to year, taxes our credulity and
seems to presage the arrival of that period when human improvement
must end.'"  As Jeffery shows, it's evident from the rest of that
report that Commissioner Ellsworth was simply using a bit of
rhetorical flourish to emphasize that the number of patents was
growing at a great rate.  Far from considering inventions at an end,
he outlined areas in which he expected patent activity to increase,
and it is clear he was making plans for the future."
 
"When Commissioner Ellsworth did resign in 1845, his letter of
resignation certainly gave no indication that he was resigning because
he thought there was nothing left for the Patent Office to do.  He
gave as his reason the pressure of private affairs, and stated, 'I
wish to express a willingness that others may share public favors and
have an opportunity to make greater improvements'.  He indicated that
he would have resigned earlier if it had not been for the need to
rebuild after the fire of 1836, which had destroyed the Patent Office
building.  In any case, the letter of resignation should have put an
end to any notion that his comment in the 1843 report was to be taken
literally."
 
Another story surfaced in a TRW Corporation ad in the fall of 1985, in
a number of periodicals, including "Harpers" and "Business Week".  The
quote in Mr. Brader's .signature was listed there.  When Sass asked
TRW for the source, they referred to "The Book of Facts and
Fallacies", by Chris Martin and David Langford (1981, St. Martin's
Press), and "The Experts Speak", by Christopher Cerf and Victor
Navasky (1984, Pantheon).
 
Martin and Langford had a garbled version of Commissioner Ellsworth's
1843 statement, but also "'We suppose that at just about any period in
history one can imagine, the average dim-witted official will have
doubted that anything new can be produced; the attitude cropped up
again in 1899, the the director of the U.S. Patent Office urged
President McKinley to abolish the office, and even the post of
director, since 'everything that can be invented has been invented.'"
 
Note that the head of the U.S. Patent Office is "Commissioner", not
"director".
 
Charles H. Duell, Commissioner in 1899, in his report to President
McKinley in 1899, quotes from McKinley's annual message: "'Our future
progress and prosperity depend on our ability to equal, if not
surpass, other nations in the enlargement and advance of science,
industry and commerce.  To invention we must turn as one of the most
powerful aids to the accomplishment of such a result.'  Duell then
adds, 'May not our inventors hopefully look to the Fifty-sixth
Congress for aid and effectual encouragement in improving the American
patent system?'  Surely these words are not those of some kind of
idiot who believes that everything has already been invented.  Other
information in that report also definitely refutes any such notion.
Duell presents statistics showing the growth in the number of patents"
[per annum?]  "from 435 in 1837 to 25,527 in 1899.  In the one year
between 1898 and 1899" [sic] "there was an increase of 3,000" [about
13%].  "It's hardly likely that he would expect a sudden and abrupt
ending to patent applications."
 
The other book, by Cerf and Navasky, give the quote "everything that
can be invented has been invented", and cite it as if it had been in
Duell's 1899 report.  Unlike Morgan and Langford, Cerf and Navasky has
a source list, which reads "'Charles H. Duell, quote from Chris Morgan
and David Langford, 'Facts and Fallacies'."  In short, the quote in
the second book is merely a copy of the first.
 
"On the theory that the 'Nation' is a responsible publication, I wrote
to Mr. Navasky, who is editor of that magazine and coauthor of the
book, to ask if he could tell me where and when Commissioner Duell
made the stupid statement attributed to him.  I did not receive a
reply."
 
--
 
             Tim, the Bizarre and Oddly-Dressed Enchanter
 
Center for      |||  Internet, BITNET:  mcdaniel@uicsrd.csrd.uiuc.edu
Supercomputing  |||  UUCP:     {uunet,convex,pur-ee}!uiucuxc!uicsrd!mcdaniel
Research and    |||  ARPANET:  mcdaniel%uicsrd@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu
Development,    |||  CSNET:    mcdaniel%uicsrd@uiuc.csnet
U of Illinois   |||  DECnet:   GARCON::"mcdaniel@uicsrd.csrd.uiuc.edu"
cudkeys:
cuddy10 cudenmcdaniel cudfnTim cudlnMcDaniel cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszL cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / James Morad /  Re: Purpose of alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: james@CSUStan.EDU (James Morad)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Purpose of alt.fusion
Date: 11 Apr 89 02:43:32 GMT
Organization: Calif. State Univ., Stanislaus, Turlock, Ca

 
   Pardon my ignorance of scientific technology but I am a C.S. major at a
small university and we dont talk much about these subjects(what we might
know as individual sets us apart from each other and makes one person"smarter"
than the other and therefore we don't discuss much). I have heard a lot of
exciting talk about fusion tech, and its possibilities have evoked pictures
of a world without energy problems in my mind. Do you really think the Oil
companies will screw up any developments in this feild with their billions
of dollars of influence? I think they will try and probably succeed unless some
scientists put the well being of the world as a community before visions of
grandeure. Maybe you could point me to some sources of introductory info on
the subject of fusion without my having to take courses in physics.. This is
probably the only chance I get to talk tech on any particular subject at this
school..
                             thanks
                               james
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenjames cudfnJames cudlnMorad cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.10 / ron clayton /  Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
     
Originally-From: ron@pmafire.UUCP (ron clayton)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
Date: 10 Apr 89 14:51:19 GMT
Organization: WINCO, INEL, Idaho

In article <89Apr7.133215edt.18548@me.utoronto.ca> fil@hammer.me.UUCP
(Filippo Salustri) writes:
>In article <1586@attdso.att.com> tim@attdso.att.com (Tim J Ihde) writes:
>>In article <Mar.29.01.31.38.1989.26758@caip.rutgers.edu> giraldi@caip.
utgers.edu (John Giraldi) writes:
>>[...]
>>Seeing as that at this time he must have been talking about fission power,
>>I'm glad they never whent through with this plan.  Even those who accept
>>fission reactors as relativly safe should have problems with a fission
>>powered airplane.  A nuclear sub would just sink (bad enough), but can you
>>imagine a fission reactor in a plane strewn over several miles when the
>>thing crashes?  A plane crash is much more likely than a meltdown . . .
>
>	There *was* a fission powered experimental plane.  Forget the name;
>it was an X-something.  I think it was a converted B29.  Had the reactor
>tucked into the back end of the tail.  Their major trouble was that they
>couldn't find a way to get enough power out of it and to the props (the test
>flights always had the reactor running, but unhooked from the propulsion
>system.  Eventually, of course, the project was scrapped.
>
 
If you are ever in Idaho during the summer time, stop by at the INEL's
(Idaho National Engineering Laboratory) EBR I (Experimental Breeder
Reactor I).  This is the first fission reator to generate electricity.
It is inactive, but they have tours in the summer.  They also have two
nuclear powered aircraft engines on display.  These engines were
developed at the INEL in the late 50s, early 60s.  If you saw them, it
would be obvious why they never flew.  These things are HUGE.  They must
weigh 20 or 30 tons each.  EBR I is 60 miles west of Idaho Falls on
highway US 20, on the way to Craters of the Moon Park and Sun Valley
resort.
 
Ron Clayton
ron@uunet!pmafire
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.10 / John Logajan /  Neutron counts
     
Originally-From: logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Neutron counts
Date: 10 Apr 89 21:01:25 GMT
Organization: Network Systems Corp. Mpls MN

Clarification please.  It is both claimed that F+P detected 40,000
neutrons in 50 hours (detected or estimated based upon detection
efficiency?) and that that level is three times background.
 
40,000/50 is on the order of 1000 neutrons per hour or one neutron
every three seconds.  Am I to believe that the neutron rate at the
U of U background is one neutron every 10 seconds????  Seems awfully
high to me.
 
On the other hand, someone said the rate was 40,000 neutrons per
second -- which, if three time background, sure makes the background
kinda HOT!
 
--
- John M. Logajan @ Network Systems; 7600 Boone Ave; Brooklyn Park, MN 55428  -
- ...rutgers!umn-cs!ns!logajan / logajan@ns.network.com / john@logajan.mn.org -
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 /  andrew /  Re: deuterium harmful?
     
Originally-From: andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Re: deuterium harmful?
Date: 11 Apr 89 02:56:55 GMT
Organization: National Semiconductor, Santa Clara

 
...will require inordinate blending skill, achievable by only the finest of
bartenders (mainly at seaside hotels). The Scots brew, Heavy, will take
on an entirely different meaning. sorry.
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / C Schanck /  Re: Fusion Company Names
     
Originally-From: schanck@harmonica.cis.ohio-state.edu (Christopher Schanck)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fusion Company Names
Date: 11 Apr 89 03:56:20 GMT
Organization: Ohio State University Computer and Information Science

In article <1989Apr10.142730.17575@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester.edu
 (Paul Dietz) writes:
 
>If the University of Utah wants to form a start-up company to develop
>the fusion discovery, what should they name it?
>My vote:  UUdyne.
 
UUdyne? As in YoYoDyne, "Where the future begins tomorrow!"?
 
 
-=-
"The future of the human race is in the hands of the telephone company!"
			--- Dr. Harrison Blackwood, "War of the Worlds"
Christopher Schanck --> schanck@cis.ohio-state.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Mike Haertel /  terrorists, bombs, & cold fusion
     
Originally-From: mike@thor.acc.stolaf.edu (Mike Haertel)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: terrorists, bombs, & cold fusion
Date: 11 Apr 89 03:52:08 GMT
Organization: St. Olaf College; Northfield, MN

A problem with making bombs is holding them together long enough
to produce enough energy to make a really big bang.  This is not
so hard with your garden-variety fission weapons (and by extension
hydrogen bombs) because they involve really fast reactions in
large doses.  But cold fusion, being cold, implies a comparitively
low power density.  Power density of 10 Kw/cm^3 (as Fleischmann
and Pons suggest may be possible with tritium) is still several
orders of magnitude out of the practical bomb ballpark.  Let's
stop worrying about terrorists and talk about something interesting.
--
Mike Haertel <mike@stolaf.edu>
In Hell they run VMS.
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenmike cudfnMike cudlnHaertel cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / jeffrey templon /  Re: New idea from Joe Doehler about possible mechanism:
     
Originally-From: templon@silver.bacs.indiana.edu (jeffrey templon)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: New idea from Joe Doehler about possible mechanism:
Date: 11 Apr 89 05:25:47 GMT
Organization: Indiana University BACS, Bloomington

In article <28742@apple.Apple.COM> jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer) writes:
>
>Joe Doehler of Energy Conversion Devices suggests that the
>
>D + D -> T + p
>
>reaction leads to protons with more than 3MeV energy. It then
>turns out that
>
>p + p + 3MeV -> pion
>
>...and the pion decays to a muon!
>
	You MUST not mean what you say.  The reaction that you suggest
(p + p + 3 MeV -> pion) violates baryon number conservation.  If you mean
what I think you must mean, p + p + 3MeV -> d + pion (or 2p + pi, or p+n+pi)
then you don't violate baryon number conservation but you do violate
conservation of energy.  An experiment was run here a few years back to
measure this reaction; by the time conservation of momentum was thrown in,
you need p + p + 214 MeV to make pions!
	I also don't understand how the proton is supposed to get the
extra energy.  Does he want to violate conservation of momentum?
 
				Jeff Templon
				Nuclear Physics Grad Student
			(not for much longer!)
				Indiana U. Cyclotron Facility
 
ps - the 214 MeV number is off the top of my head, so don't flame if it
is actually 208 or somesuch.  It is certainly more than 135 MeV, the
equivalent energy (mc**2) of the pion mass.
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudentemplon cudfnjeffrey cudlntemplon cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Michael McClary /  Re: Fleischmann and Pons paper
     
Originally-From: michael@xanadu.COM (Michael McClary)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fleischmann and Pons paper
Date: 11 Apr 89 05:51:26 GMT
Organization: Xanadu Operating Company, Palo Alto, CA

In article <11797@ut-emx.uucp> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
(Heavily edited for brevity and >>emphasis<<.)
>
> A number of people wrote to me requesting preprints and additional
> information. [...]  I have sent a copy by Fax to Vincent
> Cate, who has offered to make it available via anonymous ftp.
>
> >> I am actually a little surprised that I got a copy well before	<<
> >> a number of people with a more direct professional interest.	<<
 
I'm not.  Looks like he asked AFTER F&P became aware of the net's reaction
to the BYU paper, and they knew why he was asking...
 
The cold fusion event is also a second breakthrough:  This is where the
open computer networks replaced
 
 - peer-reviewed journals,
 - newspapers and commercial news networks
 
on a matter of great historical significance and visibility.
 
-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
	These are the days of miracle and wonder.
	[]
	Staccato signals of constant information
-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenmichael cudfnMichael cudlnMcClary cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Gary Crum /  E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: crum@panarea.usc.edu (Gary L. Crum)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 11 Apr 89 06:44:54 GMT

When fusion occurs, is matter converted to energy according to E=m*c*c?
If so, then what matter is converted to energy during the hypothesized
"cold fusion" nuclear reactions?  If not, then is there any known process
where a transformation from matter to energy or from energy to matter
is thought to occur?
 
Pardon my ignorance;  I have been away from my physics texts and Niven
books for some time.  I ask only because this is "alternate" group, and
one that is already full of redundancy noise.  I wonder about fission as
well as fusion.
 
Thanks in advance,
Gary
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudencrum cudfnGary cudlnCrum cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.10 / daniel mocsny /  Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
     
Originally-From: dmocsny@uceng.UC.EDU (daniel mocsny)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion - possible indications?
Date: 10 Apr 89 15:33:09 GMT
Organization: Univ. of Cincinnati, College of Engg.

In article <16922@cup.portal.com>, RCH@cup.portal.com (Ric C Helton) writes:
> 4/7/89 11:34 jerry@olivey.olivetti.com (Jerry Aguirre)
> >In article <1134@rpi.edu> ncc1701@pawl.rpi.edu (Mark O. Chadwick) writes:
> >> ... a bomber ... used NUCLEAR power.  It's a good thing that didn't crash,
> >> or a mess would certainly have been generated!
> >
> >Yes, it would be terrible.  Even worse, imagine if they carried nuclear
> >BOMBS in airplanes and one of those crashed.  Just think about one or
> >more bombs spread out over several square miles! :-)
>
> Um... I think bombs have to be armed in order to explode....
> Don't they? :-)
 
The armed forces of the nuclear club countries have had many accidents
with atomic warheads, but they have never (so far as we know) had one
of those puppies let go accidentally. I have read about
atom-bomb-carrying planes crashing or accidentally releasing (unarmed)
bombs (I believe one famous incident involved an accidental drop from
a B-52 off the coast of Spain, leading to a frantic effort to recover
the submerged bomb). Accidents have also occurred with ICMBs. I recall
reading of a fire in a missile silo that caused an ICBM booster to
explode, lofting the warhead several hundred feet, but no nuclear
detonation occurred. (I can't recall whether the explosion blew the
lid off the silo, or if the silo was already open, but I am pretty
sure I recall reading that the warhead did end up out on the grass.)
 
Un-armed warheads are much safer than fission reactors because they
are smaller, stronger, have fewer moving parts and no working fluids,
are not undergoing a nuclear reaction already (and are thus in a far
more stable state), and are not full of high-level nuclear waste.
Even if a bomb were to break open on impact and scatter its contents,
they would not contaminate a very large area and they should be
relatively easy to recover (being metallic) if crews reached the site
quickly (and they probably would, if it were on land---over water the
bomb would be very unlikely to break).
 
Dan Mocsny
dmocsny@uceng.uc.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy10 cudendmocsny cudfndaniel cudlnmocsny cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 /  MacLeod /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: macleod@drivax.UUCP (MacLeod)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 11 Apr 89 00:26:45 GMT
Organization: Digital Research, Monterey, CA

In article <1989Apr2.145310.29132@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester.e
u (Paul Dietz) writes:
 
:The four stages of reaction to a great invention:
:
:	1. It's impossible.
:	2. It's impractical.
:	3. It's immoral.
:	4. I said all along it was a great idea.
:
:Solid state fusion is heading into stage #2.  To help the process along,
:here are some spurious objections we may be hearing (stage #3):
:
:  Solid state fusion is immoral because...
:
:  a. Palladium comes from S. Africa.
:  b. It's NUCLEAR (add look of horror).
:  c. It distracts people from the virtuous activity of
:     energy conservation.
:  d. It will let people generate so much energy the earth
:     will be overheated.
:  e. It will increase the gap between the Rich and the Poor.
:  f. The military can use it.
:  g. It will deplete the Earth of deuterium, changing forever
:     the isotopic composition of the oceans.
:  h. It has seduced scientists with visions of enormous profits
:     (which we KNOW are evil).
:
:Any others?  ;-)
 
But of course!
 
   i. It will kill dolphins.
   j. It will kill whales.
   k. It will kill blue-green algae.
   l. It will kill everything in the ocean.
   m. It will kill everything.
   n. Moving asteroids for their metals will cause chaos, and the
      planets will crash into each other, killing the solar system.
 
But the most important:
 
* IT'S AGAINST THE WILL OF GOD *
 
 
Michael Sloan MacLeod  (amdahl!drivax!macleod)
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenmacleod cudlnMacLeod cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.10 / David Wright /  Fusion story on BBC TV
     
Originally-From: dww@stl.stc.co.uk (David Wright)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Fusion story on BBC TV
Date: 10 Apr 89 20:48:31 GMT
Organization: STC Technology Limited, London Road, Harlow, Essex, UK

Thought a few of you - well in the UK at least - might be interested in
the treatment of the Cold Fusion story on BBC TV.   They first had an
item on it when the news first broke - I didn't believe it at the time
(not sure I do now).  Tonight's 9pm News had a report "Scientists at
the University of Texas have successfully repeated the experiment first
run by scientists from Southampton and Utah..."
 
A spokesman was shown saying "we have had it running for 40 hours now
....  we are seeing 60-80% excess energy .... but we are still not sure
if it is some chemical effect ...".   Pictures of some glass-with-wires
apparatus were shown, glowing unevenly - it looked a bit like
electrical arcing.
 
The reporter finished with "this might - just might - be the start of cheap,
safe nuclear power".
 
Regards,      David Wright       STL, London Road, Harlow, Essex  CM17 9NA, UK
dww@stl.stc.co.uk <or>  ...uunet!mcvax!ukc!stl!dww <or>  PSI%234237100122::DWW
Usenet works on the principle that 10,000 people know more about the answer to
any question than one does.  Unfortunately they know 10,000 different answers.
cudkeys:
cuddy10 cudendww cudfnDavid cudlnWright cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Mark Thorson /  Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
     
Originally-From: mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
Date: 11 Apr 89 05:13:34 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

I saw some footage on the network news tonight of the Texas A&M group
claiming to have reproduced the Utah results, in terms of the amount of
heat generated.
 
Behind their apparatus (which looked similar to the Utah apparatus) there
was a flashing light.  It was flashing on and off at about 1 Hz, about 50%
duty cycle.  Other than its location, it appeared to have no connection
to the apparatus.  It was rather bright, and somewhat distracting.
 
What was that thing doing there?  It seemed to give the place a kind of
weird aura, like the presence of a Jacob's ladder.  I was hoping the
Aggie results would be the first non-Mormon, non-Communist verification
of the Utah results, but this flashing light makes me wonder.
 
Georgia Tech also confirmed the results today, in terms of neutrons.
Those people seem more normal.
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenmmm cudfnMark cudlnThorson cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Mark Thorson /  Powdered Palladium Electrodes
     
Originally-From: mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson)
Newsgroups: sci.chem,sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Powdered Palladium Electrodes
Date: 11 Apr 89 05:46:53 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

In response to my query about the preparation of palladium powder, I have
received two independent responses by e-mail indicating that Pons has
specifically warned against it.  He didn't say what would happen, but the
implication is it would be dangerous.
 
Of course, to some of us, that's like waving a red flag in front of a bull :-)
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenmmm cudfnMark cudlnThorson cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 /  Sisyphus /  Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
     
Originally-From: indigo@reed.UUCP (Sisyphus)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: What would fusion power do to Japan?
Date: 11 Apr 89 04:49:41 GMT
Organization: Reed College of the First Class, not Texas

 
 
Even if Japan were able to develop a non-dependent energy source, the
country still would have to import a large amount of food and material.  I
believe that Japan imports almost 90% of its meat consumption, and over 50%
of its fruit/vegetable consumption.  Let's put it this way: you can't feed
electrical energy to starving human beings.  :-) At the same time, Japan
still needs petroleum, not for using it as fuel but for producing chemicals
and plastics.  Japan still needs to import it, since there are no major oil
wells in or nearby the country.
 
Maybe some fringe elements in Japanese government would start calling for
less co-operative attitude toward foreign countries, but they would be
quieted down almost immediately by more mainstream elements.  I don't think
that Japan would become more "arrogant" as a result of a successful fusion
energy.
 
(A note to Earl Kinmouth:  all of the figures above are my own speculations,
so please do not scream out "EVIDENCES!!!!????" in follow-ups.  :-)
 
--Hiroshi
--
"Ugliness had come to ugliness	| Hiroshi Ogura >Catalyst Extraordinarie<
 for mutual support; but there	| indigo@reed.BITNET or tektronix!reed!indigo
 had been little comfort as a 	| 3755 SE Reedway, Puddletown, Oregon 97202
 result"  --  V. S. Naipaul	| Ewe Ess of Eigh   503-774-5061
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenindigo cudlnSisyphus cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Mark Thorson /  Re: deuterium harmful?
     
Originally-From: mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Re: deuterium harmful?
Date: 11 Apr 89 05:36:10 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

The cover article for the July 1960 issue of Scientific American has a
good article titled "The Biology of Heavy Water".  The first biological
experiments were performed by Lewis at UCB in 1932, who fed heavy water to mice.
 
No organ absorbs deuterium preferentially.  Low levels cause infertility
in males, but otherwise no effect.  In rats, high levels cause several
symptoms, including convulsions and death.  High means 30% deuterated.
The 35% level causes distress in mammals and paramecium, but after an
adaptation period paramecium grow normally.  Induced tumors grow much
more slowly in 25% deuterated mice than in normal mice.
 
Chemical bonds are slightly more stable with deuterium than with hydrogen.
Carbon-deuterium bonds react at about one-half to one-seventh the rate of
carbon-hydrogen bonds.
 
My impression from reading this article is that deuterium is not particularly
toxic, but you shouldn't drink it.  I'd be interested in knowing whether the
anti-tumor effect has been fully investigated.  Who knows, it might be a
treatment for AIDS.
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenmmm cudfnMark cudlnThorson cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Paul Dietz /  Re: Is the P&F result a D + D -> HE4 reaction?
     
Originally-From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Is the P&F result a D + D -> HE4 reaction?
Date: 11 Apr 89 13:06:09 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

In article <1630@vicom.COM> steve@vicom.COM (Steve Maurer) writes:
 
>    Current observation has found that when deuterium combines, it
>generates either HE3 or H3 (tritium), not HE4.    However, this has
>ALL been the result of extremely high speed/high energy particle
>bashing.   It is not the result of tunnelling.
 
Yes, it is the result of tunneling.  At the energies attained in
conventional fusion devices the nuclei cannot touch in a classical
sense -- they just get close enough so that the tunneling rate is high
enough for the chance of a reaction to be significant during the brief
instant of close approach.
 
>One way P&F may be
>getting all that energy is through a D+D->HE4 reaction, which would
>produce a tremendous amount of energy ( approx 23 MeV ) but not a
>single neutron.    If even a small percentage of these reactions were
>of the HE4 variety, it would do much to explain the seemingly anomalous
>data which P&F gathered.
 
But, *what* carries off the energy?  If you make 4He from d+d, the
helium nucleus cannot just fly off by itself -- that violates conservation
of momentum.  There *is* a (d,gamma) reaction, but that cannot be
the energy source P & F are seeing, because several watts of 23 MeV
gamma rays would be very noticable (and moderately lethal).  23 MeV
gammas would also make a reasonable number of photoneutrons.
 
	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudendietz cudfnPaul cudlnDietz cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Henry Spencer /  Re: deuterium harmful?
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Re: deuterium harmful?
Date: 11 Apr 89 17:56:19 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <28752@apple.Apple.COM> jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer) writes:
>I hope this is humorous. I do, I do. (That is, I hope that Henry is
>_not_ claiming that heavy water ain't poisonous.) Sounds like a cute
>item, though, disturbing your sense of balance. A little unfamiliar,
>though, to be sure. I have never heard that explanation for ethanol
>effects.
 
I'm not claiming it's not toxic, just that I haven't heard of it being
so (although admittedly this is an area I don't keep up on).  The balance
effects are for real; the info came from a talk by Dr. Ken Money, who's
one of the world's top authorities on motion sickness.  Dose a cat with
ethanol and it gets motion sick but is too drunk to care.  Dose it with
heavy water and it gets motion sick and is quite alarmed about it.  Dose
it with the right mixture and it's happily drunk but not motion sick.
 
(Animal lovers who are upset about this should note that Dr. Money himself
gets motion sick once a week as part of his lab's research -- there is a
long tradition in aerospace medicine of using the head of the lab as a
guinea pig.  The ethanol/D2O experiment was run in animals because the
doses of ethanol were large enough to be somewhat dangerous.)
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenhenry cudfnHenry cudlnSpencer cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Thomas Wang /  Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
     
Originally-From: ttwang@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Thomas Wang)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
Date: 11 Apr 89 20:47:42 GMT
Organization: Cal Poly State University -- San Luis Obispo

In article <18269@glacier.STANFORD.EDU> jbn@glacier.UUCP (John B. Nagle) writes:
>      It's still not clear if the heat energy produced stems from a
>chemical or nuclear process.  It's possible that low-level neutron
>flux comes from fusion but the heat comes from a chemical reaction.
>The question, of course, is how long the heat output can be maintained.
 
Hopefully one can answer the chemical vs nuclear question by running a control
experiment.  By replacing D2O with H2O, and still getting the same heat
output would imply chemical process.  If the control experiment produces no
heat, then nuclear process would be more likely.
 
If I were doing the D2O experiment, then I would also check the Palladium after
the experiment for traces of light elements.
 
 -Thomas Wang ("I am, therefore I am."
                 - Akira               )
 
                                                     ttwang@polyslo.calpoly.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenttwang cudfnThomas cudlnWang cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Henry Spencer /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 11 Apr 89 17:05:17 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <6951@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney) writes:
> [ subnuclear reactions? ]
>This opens a terrifying prospect of a new generation of weapons with
>potential explosive yields in the gigaton range, or even higher...
 
No, actually it doesn't.  They aren't particularly *useful*.  It would
not be difficult to build a hydrogen bomb with gigaton-plus yield;
there is no fundamental limit on the size of an H-bomb.  Nobody has
bothered, for the same reason that nobody actually builds 100-megaton
bombs:  a really big nuclear bomb spends much of its energy "making
the rubble bounce" near ground zero.  Unless one is attacking an
extremely "hard" target like Cheyenne Mountain, several smaller bombs
are more effective, because their energy can be spread out.  The biggest
nuclear weapon in the US arsenal is only nine megatons, and it's
considered pretty much obsolete.  Modern nuclear weapons are rarely
over a megaton or so.  The rush to build bigger and bigger bombs ended
nearly 30 years ago when its futility was recognized.
 
(Actually, its futility was recognized, but not acted on, still earlier:
the Oppenheimer report, circa 1950, stated that there was no plausible
military requirement for the hydrogen bomb.)
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenhenry cudfnHenry cudlnSpencer cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Henry Spencer /  Re: New idea from Joe Doehler about possible mechanism:
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: New idea from Joe Doehler about possible mechanism:
Date: 11 Apr 89 17:59:21 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <3711@silver.bacs.indiana.edu> templon@silver.UUCP (jeffrey templon) writes:
>	You MUST not mean what you say.  The reaction that you suggest
>(p + p + 3 MeV -> pion) violates baryon number conservation...
 
I agree that the reaction cited is unlikely, as it also violates charge
conservation (unless there are doubly-charged pions!), but one should
remember that baryon number conservation is not sacred.  Proton decay,
which several groups are actively looking for, would violate it.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenhenry cudfnHenry cudlnSpencer cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Steven Beste /  The first company will be...
     
Originally-From: denbeste@bbn.com (Steven Den Beste)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: The first company will be...
Date: 11 Apr 89 20:50:59 GMT
Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc., Cambridge MA

...Sharper Image, that great purveyor of technotoys. They'll sell a
fusion-powered display gizmo suitable for coffee tables, at an outragous price.
 
Why them? They have no competitors, they have no vested interest in any of the
industries which will be rototilled, and they have a large customer base of
techno-toy freaks (like me) who will buy something ONLY because it is new and
gee-whiz.
 
If they can sell a plasma-toy for $1100, they can sell an F/P cell for $500.
 
Reminds me of an ad style I might have heard when young: "Be the first on your
block to own a fusion-powered mobile. Everyone will envy you!"
 
 
Steven C. Den Beste,   BBN Communications Corp., Cambridge MA
denbeste@bbn.com(ARPA/CSNET/UUCP)    harvard!bbn.com!denbeste(UUCP)
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudendenbeste cudfnSteven cudlnBeste cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Daniel Hinojosa /  Re: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
     
Originally-From: hinojosa@hp-sdd.hp.com (Daniel Hinojosa)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
Date: 11 Apr 89 21:13:25 GMT
Organization: HP, San Diego Division

In article <17008@cup.portal.com> mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson) writes:
>[...]
>was a flashing light.  It was flashing on and off at about 1 Hz, about 50%
>duty cycle.  Other than its location, it appeared to have no connection
>to the apparatus.  It was rather bright, and somewhat distracting.
 
My impression was that the emitted light was from the experiment itself.
 
>Georgia Tech also confirmed the results today, in terms of neutrons.
>Those people seem more normal.
 
However Georgia Tech aslo did not have reports of excess heat generation.
This is even more interesting how these two experiments show very
different results. I would be interested to find how similar the
set-ups were at the two locations.
 
 
 
 
 
--
=dan=hinojosa=========================================================
email -  uunet!ucsd!hp-sdd!hinojosa \ / uunet!hplabs!hp-sdd!hinojosa
 ---------------------------  ---==(*o*)==---  -----------------------
Jesus saves... but Gretzky gets the rebound! He shoots. HE SCOOORES!!!
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenhinojosa cudfnDaniel cudlnHinojosa cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Bill Pugh /  Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
     
Originally-From: pugh@panache.cs.umd.edu (Bill Pugh)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
Date: 11 Apr 89 15:58:56 GMT
Organization: Comp. Sci. Dept., Univ. of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742

In article <1989Apr11.102946.27470@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester.
du (Paul Dietz) writes:
>
>At Georgia Tech, researchers report detecting neutrons from their
>experiment.  They said they have found a way of treating the Pd so
>that neutron emission begins almost immediately (some way of poisoning
>the cathode, I speculate).  They took background measurements with the
>current off.  The signal when the cell was on, 600 counts per hour,
>was 13 times the background.
>
The pre-treatment was to bake the palladium rod at about 600 degrees Celsius
in a high vacuum. This forced hydrogen contaminates out of the rod and allowed
it to absorb the deuterium atoms from the heavy water more efficiently.
(From the Wall Street Journal).
 
	Bill Pugh
	University of Maryland
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Jim VanWinkle /  Cold fusion in 1926...
     
Originally-From: vanwinj@jacobs.cs.orst.edu (Jim VanWinkle)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Cold fusion in 1926...
Date: 11 Apr 89 21:50:03 GMT
Organization: Oregon State University - CS - Corvallis Oregon

Apparantly, our dept. head heard that in 1926 a patent for the
production of helium using Hydriogen and Palladium.  One possible
difficulty of the system--too much heat was probably proiduced for this
guy to keep his apparatus cool.  Actually, I have no Idea what this
swede was doing, but the anecdote kept many normally straight-laced
NE profs giggling.  (Of course, there is one frightening possibility--
what if this is true?  I mean, the patent was for Hydrogen.  We didn't
even have supplies of heavy water in '26...)
 
Jim "<Master of Neutrons>" VanWinkle
I'm not an actor, but I play one on TV
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Jon Singer /  At the Crossroads
     
Originally-From: jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: At the Crossroads
Date: 12 Apr 89 02:02:11 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc., Cupertino, CA

The way the thing looks to me at the moment is about like this:
 
	2 worlds:
 
1) BYU: a beautiful piece of work, very clean, replicated variously
around the world.
 
Results as follows: If you put Deuterium into Palladium (or various
other metals, including Titanium), you see evidence for fusion at rates
of approximately 10^ -23 per DD pair per second. This can probably
account for some of the Earth's internal heat, for funny 3He/4He ratios
in various samples, and for the possibility of Tritium release from
volcanoes. As a sidelight, it may account for Chinese reports of
Tritium in well water before earthquakes.
 
	Oddness:
 
They stress the importance of using their electrolyte mix, which is a
bunch of metal salts. In fact, in several of their runs, crap plated
out onto the metal electrode, and evidence of fusion ceased, both after
about 8 hours. What is so important about the soup?
 
---- ---- ---- ----
 
2) U of U: a most peculiar piece of work, experimentally less
impressive, but if accurate having society-shattering importance.
(Pardon my bombast.) Still somewhat uncertain.
 
Results as follows: If you put Deuterium into Palladium, and keep
going for a while, you see evidence for fusion at rates somewhat
higher than those observed at BYU. You also see heat evolution at
rates up to 10^13 higher than you can account for by the amount of
fusion you apparently see.
 
This is _decidedly_ peculiar.
 
	Other Oddness:
 
The soup is rather different, consisting only of D2O at 99.5%
concentration (remainder H2O), with 0.1M LiOD to make it conduct. How
did they choose LiOD?
 
Nothing happens here, for long periods of time, and then one sees
evidence of fusion. Why nothing in the first 8 hours? Detectors
insufficiently sensitive?
 
What is producing the excess heat?
 
Neutrons are detected, at an energy that corresponds to a reaction
that produces 3He. No 3He is detected. Instead, 4He is detected. Is it
from the other activities in the lab? Is it from some other fusion
process? What _is_ going on here?! Vote not entirely in at this time.
 
Texas A&M finds production of excess heat. They haven't looked at
radiation. Georgia Tech finds radiation. So far as I am aware (this is
a bit hazy) they make no report of excess heat...yet. One of these
groups finds that if they preheat the Pd electrode to 600 celsius in
vacuo, it starts working much quicker than if they don't preheat it.
 
 
	So:
 
Here we stand, at the crossroads. Within the next three weeks,
possibly even within the next three days, someone will get decent
measurements of both parts of the Pons and Fleischman results. Will
they see the tremendous gap between detected fusions and heat? If so,
what will the explanation be? Where did the 3He go, and where did the
4He come from?
 
--- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
 
	Some speculation:
 
 
Will 90%Pd/10%Ti show any difference in behavior?
 
Will Titanium itself work?
 
Does this reaction scale decently?
 
Which configurations are dangerous?
 
What happens if you use sintered Pd instead of solid?
 
Which configurations fail to work at all, and why (geometry? other
effects?)?
 
What happens if you put some T in with the D?
 
What if you use sulfuric acid to make it conduct, instead
of LiOD? (Even perdeuterated sulfuric acid?)
 
Are there other nice ways to stuff Deuterium into Palladium
or other metals?
 
What happens at cryogenic temperatures (for example, Pd in liquid
Deuterium, or Pd `charged' and then cooled)?
 
What kind of rate fluctuations can be observed with sufficiently
sensitive and responsive detection equipment?
 
What happens if you put the Pd into a muon beam?
 
===============================================================
 
I'm sure lots of people can come up with lots of even nicer questions,
but those are the ones that immediately occurred to me, or have
already been mentioned here in alt.fusion.
 
 
...And that's how it looks from here, Tuesday, 1989 April 11, 7PM PDT
				- Jon Singer
 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jon Singer is (feel free	|
to fill in the blank any way	|	Trigons! I must have trigons!
you wish to, ok?), and		|	Igor, find a trigon shop for me!
is also jon@Apple.COM		|
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Brian Yamauchi /  Re: Cold fusion in 1926...
     
Originally-From: yamauchi@cs.rochester.edu (Brian Yamauchi)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion in 1926...
Date: 11 Apr 89 23:51:48 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

In article <9915@orstcs.CS.ORST.EDU> vanwinj@jacobs.cs.orst.edu (Jim VanWinkle) writes:
>Apparantly, our dept. head heard that in 1926 a patent for the
>production of helium using Hydriogen and Palladium.  One possible
>difficulty of the system--too much heat was probably proiduced for this
>guy to keep his apparatus cool.  Actually, I have no Idea what this
>swede was doing, but the anecdote kept many normally straight-laced
>NE profs giggling.  (Of course, there is one frightening possibility--
>what if this is true?  I mean, the patent was for Hydrogen.  We didn't
>even have supplies of heavy water in '26...)
 
Well, is
 
	H + H --> He
 
a possible quantum fusion reaction?
 
(No wonder the neutron count was so low..... :-)
 
_______________________________________________________________________________
 
Brian Yamauchi				University of Rochester
yamauchi@cs.rochester.edu		Computer Science Department
_______________________________________________________________________________
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Kevin Williams /  Re: Success with cold fusion reported
     
Originally-From: williamsk@tolstoy.UUCP (Kevin W. Williams)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Success with cold fusion reported
Date: 11 Apr 89 22:03:30 GMT
Organization: gte

In article <10392@nsc.nsc.com>, andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew) writes:
>
> what is a desert habitat - and do we care? (i mean, isn't any improvement
> better than the status quo?)
I live in a "desert environment", and my only objection to it is the number of
people who try to grow grass and import excess water. My main fear of the steam
based heat engines that people are proposing as fusion reactors is that I will
wind up living in a soggy piece of hellish steam like Florida.
 
 
Kevin Wayne Williams
     UUCP : ...!ames!ncar!noao!asuvax!gtephx!williamsk
 
               Remember : Brute force has an elegance all its own.
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Michael Justice /  Fusion confirmation
     
Originally-From: boreas@bucsb.UUCP (Michael A. Justice)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Fusion confirmation
Date: 12 Apr 89 02:33:03 GMT
Organization: Boston Univ Comp. Sci.

From the Tuesday, April 11th edition of the Boston Globe, by David L. Chandler:
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
Physicists at the Georgia Institute of Technology announced yesterday
that they have evidence of a fusion reaction in a jar at room temperature,
corroborating reports from the University of Utah that had been received
skeptically by scientists.
[...]
Physicist Billy Livesay said in an [sic] telephone interview: ``We detected
the neutrons that would have occurred from a fusion reaction.  We also
detected the tritium,'' a byproduct of nuclear fusion.
[...]
Livesay said he had not yet seen a copy of the scientific paper describing
the Pons and Fleischmann experiment.  He said he obtained all of the infor-
mation he needed from newspaper accounts.
[...]
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Mayhaps the "news" media's coverage isn't as bad as I thought. :-)
 
			-- Michael.
--
BITNet: cscj0ac@buacca \  Michael Andrew Justice @ BU Graduate School (CS)
ARPA: boreas@bucsb.bu.edu  \     "My sophistication surprises you, Zorba?"
CSNET: boreas%bucsb@bu-cs      \  "Your existence surprises me, Bald Ape."
UUCP:...!husc6!bu-cs!bucsb!boreas  \ _The_Architect_of_Sleep_, S.R. Boyett
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Robert Panoff /  Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
     
Originally-From: panoff@hubcap.clemson.edu (Robert M. Panoff)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
Date: 11 Apr 89 21:32:03 GMT
Organization: Clemson University, Clemson, SC

In article <1989Apr11.102946.27470@cs.rochester.edu>, dietz@cs.rochester
edu (Paul Dietz) writes:
> The Wall Street Journal and the New York Times have reports
> today on the duplication of the P & F experiment at Texas A&M
> and Georgia Tech.
>
 
 
In either case was the palladium rod pure, or previously charged up
with deuterium?  The F&P studies indicate that it took months to charge
up such a rod.  If so, then the T A&M "verification" is highly
questionable (they only said they got out more enrgy than THEY put in).
 
The Georgia Tech result is more in keeping with the low levels of the
BYU/Arizona group. Neutrons, but not much heat.
 
Notice the complete lack of any shielding in any of the televised
reports? Wonder if they themselves believe large numbers of neutrons
might possibly pop out, even by accident?
 
Side note: the Texas group was offered the assistance of the cyclotron
group in measuring neutron flux or spectra; the offer was declined.
(private e-mail from A&M).
--
rmp, for the Bob's of the World
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / John Logajan /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 11 Apr 89 18:44:31 GMT
Organization: Network Systems Corp. Mpls MN

Gary L. Crum writes:
> When fusion occurs, is matter converted to energy according to E=m*c*c?
Yes.  When you light a match or turn on a flash-light, the same thing happens.
Mass disappears from the system as photons are created.  Every photon is born
at the death of mass.
 
> If so, then what matter is converted to energy during the hypothesized
> "cold fusion" nuclear reactions?
 
As an example, take the masses of two protons to equal one unit each.  If they
fuse together they do not equal a mass total of two,  rather they equal a mass
of 1.99something.  The missing mass has escaped as the energy release of
fusion -- as a photon, perhaps.
 
--
- John M. Logajan @ Network Systems; 7600 Boone Ave; Brooklyn Park, MN 55428  -
- ...rutgers!umn-cs!ns!logajan / logajan@ns.network.com / john@logajan.mn.org -
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 /  andrew /  the deal - media coverage
     
Originally-From: andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,misc.headlines
Subject: the deal - media coverage
Date: 12 Apr 89 02:07:56 GMT
Organization: National Semiconductor, Santa Clara

 
Within the hour around 6pm tonight, KQED (Bay Area radio out of San Francisco)
ran two separate reports on cold fusion: "All Things Considered" and "Monitor
Radio". Both were pretty awful, the first being much worse, especially
considering the disproportionately high quota of technically literate people
in the audience.
 
The former featured: a lawyer, a politician, a public relations secretary,
a mention of "a man from Alalbama who wanted to know the price of palladium"
(actually, he phoned me too!), a quick tour of the P&F lab by a lab.
assistant, and a social historian. Technical content: nearly unmeasurable.
 
The latter at least interviewed a scientist, from the U of Maryland. He
misquoted ("I believe I heard this morning..") an item from this net where
someone had estimated that 10ft off the top of Lake Superior would fuel
the USA for the next 15000 years. This man quoted 15 years. I found this
very sad.
The report stated also that the technique used "seawater with two
palladium electrodes".
Georgia Tech got about 10 seconds of air time, and were the only people
who mentioned neutrons. The impression conveyed was that noone else had
seen neutrons, whereas we know that this is a key piece of information,
and has been reported by ALL groups (Utah, BYU, Texas, Georgia).
 
The most interesting comment came from an environmentalist, who, addressing
the issue of "fusion powered cars", mentioned that if one simply waited
for the implementation of this technology, it would be "too late to halt
drastic greenhouse effects". At least someone gave some useful information!
=====
Andrew Palfreyman 		USENET: ...{this biomass}!nsc!logic!andrew
National Semiconductor M/S D3969, 2900 Semiconductor Dr., PO Box 58090,
Santa Clara, CA 95052-8090 ; 408-721-4788 		there's many a slip
							'twixt cup and lip
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Mike Taylor /  Re: At the Crossroads
     
Originally-From: mat@uts.amdahl.com (Mike Taylor)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: At the Crossroads
Date: 12 Apr 89 03:13:57 GMT
Organization: Amdahl Corporation, Sunnyvale CA

In article <28809@apple.Apple.COM>, jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer) writes:
>
> They stress the importance of using their electrolyte mix, which is a
> bunch of metal salts. In fact, in several of their runs, crap plated
> out onto the metal electrode, and evidence of fusion ceased, both after
> about 8 hours. What is so important about the soup?
>
Apparently the soup was created by adding more and more stuff until something
interesting happened. They wanted to save D2O and so didn't start over.
Or so I heard (needless to say, the horse didn't speak directly to me).
>
> Nothing happens here, for long periods of time, and then one sees
> evidence of fusion. Why nothing in the first 8 hours? Detectors
> insufficiently sensitive?
>
The Georgia Tech finding tends to support a theory that it takes longer
to get D atoms into the Pd if there are already H atoms there. Presumably
Pd soaks up H just lying around. Georgia Tech's procedure was intended to
drive out the H and indeed led to a fast start. This along with the H2O
test (F&P) tends also to support a finding that the D atoms are needed
for something interesting to happen.
 
So:
	Source		Heat	Neutrons
	F&P		Yes	Yes
	BYU		N/A	Yes
	Texas A&M	Yes	N/A
	Ga. Tech.	N/A	Yes
 
How 'bout someone measuring both things at the same time? Looks like
we have a classical interdisciplinary problem here. Chemists can't
do (nuclear physics) neutron measurements; physicists can't do
(electrochemistry) calorimetry.  When was the last time you measured
a fusion reaction with a WATER BATH! While watching it with your
little pink body exposed to it?
 
 
--
Mike Taylor                               ...!{hplabs,amdcad,sun}!amdahl!mat
 
[ This may not reflect my opinion, let alone anyone else's.  ]
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Dennis Thurlow /  Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
Date: 12 Apr 89 00:04:45 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC  S. Plainfield, NJ

>So who wants to speculate on which big industrial concern will be the first
>to sell a commercial, ready to operate, fusion reactor to your friendly
>local electrical company? GE? General Atomic? Westinghouse? Somebody in
>France or Japan? Someone we have never heard of yet?
 
My guess is the Mormon Church. No explanation necessary.
-nsscb!det
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Thant Tessman /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: thant@horus.SGI.COM (Thant Tessman)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 16:30:21 GMT
Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc., Mountain View, CA

In article <6722@bsu-cs.bsu.edu>, dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Rahul Dhesi) writes:
> In article <1263@ns.network.com> logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan) writes:
> >Mass disappears from the system as photons are created.  Every photon is born
> >at the death of mass.
>
> Er, no.  Mass disappears from the system as photons leave it.  If the
> system were perfectly insulated against all radiation and particle
> leakage, its mass could not change.
>
> Photons have mass.
>
> Other than this minor detail, you are correct about the conversion of
> matter (not mass) to energy.
> --
> Rahul Dhesi <dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu>
> UUCP:    ...!{iuvax,pur-ee}!bsu-cs!dhesi
 
Er, no.  It's been a while, but I'm pretty sure photons don't have mass.  They
do however have momentum.
 
I'm also pretty sure that no mass is lost in a chemical reaction (like
lighting a match).  The energy comes from atoms falling into potential wells
which gets them wiggling faster which is measured as an increase in
temperature.
 
It gets sticky because the difference in momentum between two systems (e.g.
a proton and electron versus a neutron) shows up as a difference in their
masses.  But it is purely a matter of taste which parameter in E=mc^2 and
F = dP/dt you pin down (except for c of course).
 
thant@sgi.com
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Emmett Black /  D+D -> He4
     
Originally-From: blackje@sunspot.steinmetz (Emmett Black)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion,crd.fusion
Subject: D+D -> He4
Date: 12 Apr 89 18:14:46 GMT
Organization: GE Research; Schenectady, NY  12345

I'm posting this for a friend; please reply or attribute directly to him:
 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
The Steve Maurer contribution to sci.physics, article 6306, proposes
(from an unnamed physicist) the reaction D+D -> He4 for a fusion reaction
without neutron emission. It couldn't happen in free space without
violating conservation of momentum, since you have to give out a lot of
energy with zero net momentum. But in a lattice you could somehow emit
two phonons (quanta of lattice vibrations) in opposite directions.
It would be the analogue of positron-electron annhilation, which (usually)
results in the emission of two photons in opposite directions.
 
Someone who is expert in the Moessbauer effect should comment.
 
Ben Green
 
 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
--Emmett
	J.E.Black; GE Research/K1-3C26; Schenectady, NY 12345
	blackje@crd.ge.com;   ...!uunet!steinmetz!crd!blackje
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / James Propp /  Cold fusion: an otherworldly explanation
     
Originally-From: propp@cartan.berkeley.edu (James Propp)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Cold fusion: an otherworldly explanation
Date: 12 Apr 89 19:10:30 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley

A few days ago I got to thinking "Gee, it's a shame Richard Feynman isn't
alive to see all this cold-fusion stuff; he would have gotten a big kick
out of it."
 
And then I remembered: Isn't there some tradition that when a great
physicist dies, he gets to enact a new law of nature?
 
Hmm...
 
Think about it.  Isn't test-tube fusion EXACTLY the sort of joke you'd
expect from the guy who disgraced Morton Thiokol using just an O-ring
and a glass of ice-water?
 
It's good to see that death hasn't cramped Dick's sense of humor!
 
 
 
Jim Propp (propp@cartan.berkeley.edu)
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Glen Ditchfield /  Re: Economic feasibility of cold fusion
     
Originally-From: gjditchfield@watmsg.waterloo.edu (Glen Ditchfield)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Economic feasibility of cold fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 15:35:54 GMT
Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario

In article <1989Apr4.153045.3424@mntgfx.mentor.com> mosurm@mntgfx.mentor
com (Mosur Mohan) writes:
>Just did a little calculating, and it wasn't awfully promising.
>
>Well, how does one use the heat energy from cold fusion?  About the
>only way I can think of is to to boil water to run a turbine to
>generate electricity ...
 
Who needs electricity?  Just transfer the heat to some water and use it to
heat your apartment building or fill your bath tub.
 
I know nothing about commercial heating systems, so I can't calculate
costs.  Any volunteers out there?
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / John Logajan /  Re: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
     
Originally-From: logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
Date: 12 Apr 89 16:01:23 GMT
Organization: Network Systems Corp. Mpls MN

Daniel Hinojosa writes:
> My impression was that the emitted light was from the experiment itself.
 
After watching the report several times on CNN, it appeared to me that the
flashing was from some external apparatus.  I could see the palladium rod,
of the dimensions mentioned by F+P, suspended in the liquid.  The flashing
seemed to be coming from something behind and outside the test-tube.  I
am a bit biased, however, as I have done some electrolysis experiments and
never observed flashing unless I accidently touched the conductors together.
 
I have no idea what the light was doing.  The rate seemed a bit random.  They
might have been using it as a heat source (but that seems kind of an odd way
to induce heat -- requiring precise calibration, yet with many induced
variables.)
 
Anyhow, I wouldn't put too much emphasis on the light production.
 
--
- John M. Logajan @ Network Systems; 7600 Boone Ave; Brooklyn Park, MN 55428  -
- ...rutgers!umn-cs!ns!logajan / logajan@ns.network.com / john@logajan.mn.org -
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 /  bakerj@silver. /  Re: short-term economic impact of cold
     
Originally-From: bakerj@silver.bacs.indiana.edu
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: short-term economic impact of cold
Date: 12 Apr 89 18:08:00 GMT
Organization: Indiana University CSCI, Bloomington

 
/* Written  2:16 pm  Apr  4, 1989 by lmb@vicom.COM in silver:alt.fusion */
/* ---------- "short-term economic impact of cold " ---------- */
In article <8111@polya.Stanford.EDU> ginsberg@polya.Stanford.EDU
(Matthew L. Ginsberg) writes:
=The reason is that if the price of oil is clearly going to drop
=catastrophically in the next twenty years (say), then the price of
=oil is going to drop substantially almost immediately.  The reason
=is that the oil producers in the Middle East will no longer feel that
=they have to conserve their oil in order to preserve their money flow
=into the distant future.  As soon as it becomes clear that the price
=of oil is going down in the future, they will all start pumping as
=much as they can, as fast as they can.  And the price of oil will
=drop immediately, not twenty years from now.
 
No.  More oil output == less income - something the Saudis finally proved to
the rest of OPEC last year.  Unless you can increase your production by
10X (which even the Saudis can't), $20 oil pays better than $2 oil.
 
Oil will continue to be a valuable resource even if it not burned.  Besides,
if cold fusion really looks like it will come along, all "expensive"
exploration will stop and OPEC will have only game in town.
 
However, many of the OPEC countries have debt to service, and will try to
increase production to make payments.  I believe the cartel would collapse and
oil would reach a VERY reasonable price for lubricationa nd plastics.  Of
course after many years oil prices would gradually rise due to fewer
producers.
 
OK.  The $64 question.  It has been said that only palladium will allow the
kind of high density saturation that appears to be necessary.  Exactly how
abundant is palladium?  Is there enough that the world's energy needs could
be met, or are we talk about something that, like solar, is free power that
costs too much.  Before you flame me, I'm talking orders of magnitude here.
I know the process will be drastically improved.  Btw, what's happening to
the price of palladium?
--
Larry Blair   ames!vsi1!lmb   lmb@vicom.com
/* End of text from silver:alt.fusion */
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / John Logajan /  Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
     
Originally-From: logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
Date: 12 Apr 89 18:07:13 GMT
Organization: Network Systems Corp. Mpls MN

John B. Nagle writes:
> This is at least an interesting battery.
 
But only a heat battery -- rather low grade energy.  An electricity producing
battery would be much preferred.
 
--
- John M. Logajan @ Network Systems; 7600 Boone Ave; Brooklyn Park, MN 55428  -
- ...rutgers!umn-cs!ns!logajan / logajan@ns.network.com / john@logajan.mn.org -
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / John Logajan /  Neutron decay
     
Originally-From: logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Neutron decay
Date: 12 Apr 89 18:26:50 GMT
Organization: Network Systems Corp. Mpls MN

Tim Maroney writes:
> I was under the impression it [neutron decay] was a known decay reaction.
> I don't know whether it releases or requires energy, though.
 
Hmm, I was going to say the answer was obvious, but now I have confused
myself.  What is the rest mass of the electron, the proton and the
neutron?  If the rest mass of the neutron is less that e+p, then it must
require energy input for neutron decay.  If the rest mass of n is
greater than e+p then neutron decay must liberate energy.
 
I seem to recall that free neutrons decay with a half-life on the order
of eight minutes.  So I will look up the rest masses tonight, and tomorrow
I will know whether that decay is necessarily induced, or can occur
spontaneously.
 
--
- John M. Logajan @ Network Systems; 7600 Boone Ave; Brooklyn Park, MN 55428  -
- ...rutgers!umn-cs!ns!logajan / logajan@ns.network.com / john@logajan.mn.org -
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudenlogajan cudfnJohn cudlnLogajan cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / L Chiaraviglio /  Re: At the Crossroads
     
Originally-From: chiaravi@silver.bacs.indiana.edu (Lucius Chiaraviglio)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: At the Crossroads
Date: 12 Apr 89 19:22:56 GMT
Organization: Department of Biology at Indiana University, Bloomington

In article <28820@apple.Apple.COM> jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer) writes:
>But my original question was, really, why don't P&F see anything early
>on, when _the_BYU_people_ONLY_see_stuff_early_on_?
>
>I can't accept the notion that because P&F didn't heat their sample,
>they had a late start on the neutrons, when BYU didn't heat theirs
>either. I STILL wanna know why P&F didn't see anything at the start of
>their runs, when BYU did.
 
	I don't know if anyone has any hard evidence for this, but best I can
figure the various metals in the solution used at BYU can trap deuterium when
they are electroplated onto the palladium, thus greatly accelerating the
charging process so that the reaction can begin right away rather than having
to wait for deuterium to diffuse into the palladium (probably not a very
efficient process, especially with a big piece of palladium; with metals
being electroplated onto the palladium the deuterium may be primarily trapped
in the metal deposits and thus become concentrated rapidly rather than being
diluted by diffusing through the whole piece of palladium, which contains
other absorbed gasses).  On the other hand, the reaction soon gets quenched
when the oxides of iron and other metals that will form by oxidation by D[2]O
cover the electrode sufficiently to prevent further electrolysis.
Incidentally, if this hypothesis is correct it would mean that at least one of
the metals in the BYU electrolyte is a suitable substitute for palladium in
the cold fusion reaction.
 
	In the case of the Georgia Tech experiment it appears that degassing
the palladium beforehand speeds up the process of deuterium diffusion enough
to make the BYU salts unnecessary for rapid attainment of sufficient deuterium
concentrations to achieve cold fusion.
 
--
|  Lucius Chiaraviglio   |  ARPA:  chiaravi@silver.bacs.indiana.edu
BITNET:  chiaravi@IUBACS.BITNET (IUBACS hoses From: fields; INCLUDE RET ADDR)
ARPA-gatewayed BITNET:      chiaravi%IUBACS.BITNET@vm.cc.purdue.edu
Alt ARPA-gatewayed BITNET:  chiaravi%IUBACS.BITNET@cunyvm.cuny.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudenchiaravi cudfnLucius cudlnChiaraviglio cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Ralph Place /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: rlp@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Ralph L. Place)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 19:48:18 GMT
Organization: CS Dept, Ball St U, Muncie, IN, USA

 
The photon has zero 'rest mass' but has an equivalent relativistic
mass given by m = h/(c*lambda) where h is Planck's constant, c is
the speed of light in vacuum, and lambda is the photon wavelength.
Having zero rest mass enables it to travel at the speed of light
(what else?).
Note: the photon momentum is mc=h/lambda, making the connection
with the deBroglie wavelength formula in quantum mechanics...
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Henry Spencer /  Re: Cold fusion in 1926...
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion in 1926...
Date: 12 Apr 89 17:00:05 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <1989Apr11.195148.6341@cs.rochester.edu> yamauchi@cs.rocheste
.edu (Brian Yamauchi) writes:
>Well, is
>
>	H + H --> He
>
>a possible quantum fusion reaction?
 
Well, not in quite such simple terms -- you need to put four hydrogens in
to get the mass right -- but stars do it.  Trouble is, stars do it in a
complex multi-step reaction (actually several of them) that is glacially
slow even at the high temperatures and enormous pressures in their cores.
(When you think about it, the reaction has to be slow -- the stars last
billions of years, remember.)
 
I am inclined to consider the reports of "making helium from hydrogen"
in 1926 to be apocryphal or the result of confusing *separation* with
*generation*.  Or, possibly, correct reports of an incorrect patent --
with a few glaring exceptions, like perpetual motion machines, patent
offices do not verify that the invention works.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Henry Spencer /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 16:52:14 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <16460@oberon.USC.EDU> crum@panarea.usc.edu (Gary L. Crum) writes:
>When fusion occurs, is matter converted to energy according to E=m*c*c?
 
Yes.  If you look at the mass of the atoms going in and the atoms coming
out, there is a small loss.  (He4+n weighs a bit less than D+T, for example.)
 
>If so, then what matter is converted to energy during the hypothesized
>"cold fusion" nuclear reactions? ..
 
Depends on which hypothetical reaction you are talking about.  There isn't
any difference between cold fusion and hot fusion in this regard, except
in the very minor aspect that different reactions may be involved.
 
>... I wonder about fission as well as fusion.
 
Same thing "in reverse":  the heavy nucleus that you start with weighs
a bit more than the pieces of debris that come out.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Paul Dietz /  Cold Fusion
     
Originally-From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Cold Fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 21:29:36 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

I just attended a seminar and discussion on cold fusion at our
Chem. Eng. department.  Most of the stuff was a presentation of
the UU and BYU papers.  Some interesting factoids:
 
Hydrogen in palladium is believed by most to exist mostly as hydride
(H-) ions, not as protons (H+).  The H- ions are in the octahedral
sites.  Band theory calculations support this, and the metal-hydrogen
distance in PdH(x), 1.3 angstroms, is the sum of the radii of the H-
and the metal in its maximum oxidation state.  The movement of
hydrogen towards negative potential can be explained if H+ exists as a
minority state, and is much more mobile than H-.  Perhaps (?) fusion
might be understood as occuring between the nuclei of deuteride ions
and free deuterons.
 
Heavily loaded PdH can be fragile.  This might explain the "melted"
electrode: the Pd electrode fragmented when the current was removed.
 
The alpha and beta phases of palladium only exist below about 24 atmospheres
of pressure.  Above that pressure the miscibility gap disappears.
 
Helium diffuses extremely slowly through palladium at room
temperature.  Therefore, most helium fusion products should still
be in the electrode.
 
	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Dan Allen /  What would Feynman say about cold fusion?
     
Originally-From: dan@Apple.COM (Dan Allen)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: What would Feynman say about cold fusion?
Date: 12 Apr 89 23:03:09 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA

In article <22974@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> propp@cartan.berkeley.edu (James Propp) writes:
>A few days ago I got to thinking "Gee, it's a shame Richard Feynman isn't
>alive to see all this cold-fusion stuff; he would have gotten a big kick
>out of it."
 
In a slightly more serious vein, since Richard Feynman is NOT around,
are any of his best students around?  Who is closest to following in his
footsteps?  And what does he/she have to say?  I too wish Feynman was
around to comment...
 
Dan Allen
Apple Computer
 
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Arnie Frisch /  Re: Fleischmann/Pons results confirmed!
     
Originally-From: arnief@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Arnie Frisch)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fleischmann/Pons results confirmed!
Date: 12 Apr 89 16:11:13 GMT
Organization: Tektronix Inc., Beaverton, Or.

In article <11894@ut-emx.UUCP>, nather@ut-emx.UUCP (Ed Nather) writes:
> In article <11422@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com>, smb@ulysses.homer.nj.att.
om (Steven M. Bellovin) writes:
> > Officials at Texas A&M have announced that researchers there have
 
 
> 3. Lithium was not mentioned in the article.  I'm still betting even money
> (up to 10 cents, max) the non-neutron heat-producing reaction is
> 6Li + 2H -> 2(4He).
> --
> Ed Nather
> Astronomy Dept, U of Texas @ Austin
 
 
This is really not my field, but ..........
 
Why is it that everyone is postulating two body reactions?  I believe
that there is a high probability of three body reactions inside of a
metal.  If there is any primitive fusion reaction, its products will
have high energy.  High energy - light particles - inside of a metal
will hold their energy through many collisions, making the likelihood
of further reactions very high.
 
Arnold Frisch
Tektronix laboratories
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / M Schiffer /  Archiving alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: mss2@tank.uchicago.edu (Michael S. Schiffer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Archiving alt.fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 22:17:17 GMT
Organization: University of Chicago

Something I was wondering: is anyone saving the contents of this
group for future reference?  If not, is anyone willing to?  Consider,
if this pans out it will be the most important technical breakthrough
of the century, at least.  Historians of science and technology will
want to look at the events surrounding the discovery of cold fusion,
and the intellectual climate in which it occurred.  Now the mass media
will be fairly well documented, what with archival videotape footage,
microfilm, and so on, and the scientific articles themselves as well.
But this newsgroup, if not unique, is at least one of the few forums for
discussion which brings together large numbers of people ranging from
scientists to educated laymen, and which reflects developments almost
in real time.  Someone has already commented that computer networks
and fax machines have disseminated the pertinent papers at a speed
previously unheard of, and with a distribution so wide that I, a lowly
undergrad, can possess them.  As a history major, I'm conscious of the
frustration of not being able to find the right sources, of being unable
to reconstruct the thoughts of a period.  But we have an opportunity
now to make life easier for the next generation's historians, as well
as providing an unprecedented window on the reaction to a major
discovery.
 
I would do it myself, but I use a school account with limited privileges.
I put this forward as a general call to preserve the history of this
discovery now, before too much is lost to the ephemeral nature of usenet
messages.  Do you really want newspaper articles and (worse) TV news reports
to serve as the only record of public reaction to cold fusion?  ("The people
of 1989 at first greeted the discovery with overwhelming apathy...")
 
Mike
mss2@tank.uchicago.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Randell Jesup /  Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
     
Originally-From: jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
Date: 12 Apr 89 19:37:54 GMT
Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA

In article <5077@hubcap.clemson.edu> panoff@hubcap.clemson.edu (Robert M. Panoff) writes:
>The Georgia Tech result is more in keeping with the low levels of the
>BYU/Arizona group. Neutrons, but not much heat.
 
	Sorry, my info states otherwise.  Georgia Tech ONLY measured neutrons
and tritium.  THEY DID NOT DO ANY CALORIMETRY.  They can neither confirm or
deny the heat measurements, but the neutron measurements are closer to
the F&P than BYU, and continued for longer than the BYU results did, also
in keeping with F&P.  They measured 12-13x background neutrons with the
current on versus current off (I don't know at what distance).  They also
detected tritium.
 
	People have stated that the BYU group seems to be better done.  This
seems incorrect to me.  Their experiment was far more random than F&P's, it
seems, especially their "soup" of metal salts.  They used so many salts that
their palladium gets covered and stops absorbing within hours (all to save
having to replace the D2O or extract the salts from it: it isn't hard).
They made no calorimetry measurements.  They appear to have not tried various
electrode combinations/sizes.
 
	We now have confirmation of the F&P results of neutrons and tritium
and measurable heat.  Explanations are still needed (be they chemical or
nuclear), but it appears F&P's experiments were right on the money in terms
of accuracy.
 
--
Randell Jesup, Commodore Engineering {uunet|rutgers|allegra}!cbmvax!jesup
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Scott Mueller /  Re: Archiving alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: scott@zorch.UU.NET (Scott Hazen Mueller)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Archiving alt.fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 04:06:19 GMT
Organization: At Home; San Jose, CA

In article <2703@tank.uchicago.edu> mss2@tank.uchicago.edu (Michael S. Schiffer) writes:
>Something I was wondering: is anyone saving the contents of this
>group for future reference?
 
As it happens, as the original proposer of alt.fusion and self-proclaimed
official mail gateway out of the group, I have been saving articles up
until I got my digest saver working.  Thus, I have articles 1-178 complete
and intact as received at zorch, and articles after 178 are saved in the
digests that I have been sending out.  It kind of occurred to me a few
days back that if this turned out to be for real I would really like to
have saved the contents of the newsgroup.
--
Scott Hazen Mueller   scott@zorch.UU.NET
(408) 298-6213        (pyramid|tolerant|uunet)!zorch!scott
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Bug Hunter /  Re: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
     
Originally-From: khearn@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Bug Hunter)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
Date: 12 Apr 89 23:46:17 GMT
Organization: Cal Poly State University -- San Luis Obispo

In article <1265@ns.network.com> logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan) writes:
>Daniel Hinojosa writes:
>> My impression was that the emitted light was from the experiment itself.
>
>After watching the report several times on CNN, it appeared to me that the
>flashing was from some external apparatus.  I could see the palladium rod,
>of the dimensions mentioned by F+P, suspended in the liquid.  The flashing
>seemed to be coming from something behind and outside the test-tube.  I
                                               ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>I have no idea what the light was doing.  The rate seemed a bit random.  They
                                               ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
 
Hmm.. this may seem a bit anti-climactic, but what random light source
  is often found at press conferences?
 
Maybe it was flashbulbs from the press photographers? Are we making a
  big deal over nothing here? It would be kind of funny...
 
Just a thought. I'm not a nuclear physicist, or anything like that.
 
Keith Hearn
 
--
Keith Hearn                   \
khearn@polyslo.calpoly.edu     \  "I drank WHAT???"
Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo       \               -- Socrates
(805) 541-2147 or (805) 756-7180 \
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Rahul Dhesi /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Rahul Dhesi)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 23:20:33 GMT
Organization: CS Dept, Ball St U, Muncie, Indiana

In article <6735@bsu-cs.bsu.edu> rlp@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Ralph L. Place) writes:
>The photon has zero 'rest mass' but has an equivalent relativistic
>mass given by m = h/(c*lambda) where h is Planck's constant, c is
>the speed of light in vacuum, and lambda is the photon wavelength.
 
Finally, a Daniel come to judgement.
 
It's a common misconception among most college students, fuelled by
badly-written physics books, that mass and energy are interconvertible.
 
Not true.  Mass is a property of matter and it is also a property of
energy.  The conversion of matter to energy preserves mass.  One gram
of matter, if converted to energy, gives exactly one gram of energy.
 
Photons can travel at the speed of light not because they have zero
mass (not true) but because (hypothetically) if they were *not*
travelling at all, they would have a zero mass.  Their actual mass is
exactly the mass of their energy, since photons are 100% energy and 0%
matter.
--
Rahul Dhesi <dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu>
UUCP:    ...!{iuvax,pur-ee}!bsu-cs!dhesi
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 /  Greg /  A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
     
Originally-From: greg@oreo.berkeley.edu (Greg)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
Date: 13 Apr 89 00:42:58 GMT
Organization: U.C. Berkeley

We have recently witnessed a curious trend in announcements concerning
the duplication of cold fusion experiments.  So far Texas A&M, Georgia
Tech, Moscow University, and some place in Hungary have announced
success.  Now I realize that we shouldn't be too snobbish about either
Western technical superiority or scholarly superiority of the Ivy
League over "Aggie" schools, but I find it odd that these four places
have set up successful experiments more quickly than any of the really
famous American universities, e.g. Caltech, Princeton, Berkeley,
and Harvard.  I believe that Texas A&M can prevail over Princeton
on occasion, but it should be an unlikely event.
 
I think that the real story is that the famous schools have gotten at
least as far as Texas A&M and Georgia Tech, only they've been keeping
quiet for longer.  After all, what is the reward for announcing
success?  Your lab is mobbed with reporters, your phone rings off the
hook, you get misquoted, and you make awkward appearances on
television.  Either the Texas A&M people didn't think about the
consequences enough, or they weren't as careful, or they're more
desparate for media attention.  Research labs in the Eastern bloc
don't have this problem since they the governments have their press
on a leash.
---
Greg
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Brett Glass /  Aggie Fusion
     
Originally-From: glass@anableps.berkeley.edu (Brett Glass)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Aggie Fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 01:03:27 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley

Apparently, the success of the fusion experiment at A&M has prompted
comments elsewhere -- not just in the press. I overheard the following
"Aggie joke" this morning:
 
A skydiving Aggie jumps out of a plane and, on the way down, is
astonished to see another Aggie coming the other way. Whereupon, he
yells to the other, "Hey, thar -- you have any idea how to work a
parachute?"
 
The upwardly-mobile Aggie responds, "Nope.... You have any idea how to
turn off a fusion reactor?"
 
<BG>
============================================================================
"One of the nicest things about mathematics, or anything else you might
 care to learn, is that many of the things which can never be, often are."
                                      Norton Juster, "The Phantom Tollbooth"
============================================================================
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Cary Lewis /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: cslewis@lily.waterloo.edu (Cary Lewis)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 17:58:21 GMT
Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario

In article <2362@van-bc.UUCP> sl@van-bc.UUCP (pri=-10 Stuart Lynne) writes:
>In article <1989Apr10.202118.7831@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
>}In article <11789@ut-emx.UUCP> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
>}>But the real killer is that the only North American source of any size
>}>is in *Canada*!  Next thing you know they'll be asking us to accept
>}>that funny-looking money of theirs. :-)
>
>}Nah, we'll take that drab green stuff of yours, in adequate quantities of
>}course.  Special just for you, palladium at only $1000/ounce.
>
>Henry, you missed the sales meeting. $1000/ounce is the price for
>members of the Commonwealth. The US or Nato price is $1100/ounce.
>
 
Wait a minute, isn't Canada a member of NATO?
 
On another point, maybe it will be Canada that will develop the first
commerical application of the F&P results. After all we're quite advanced in
the fields of nuclear science, we have the third largest source of Pd in the
world, we have (TONS) of heavy water. Maybe we should redirect the
eight billion for the subs into this research.
 
But who knows, it will be probably be years before any of this happens, and as
was mentioned we have lots of
pressing environmental problems that we must (i.e. have to) solve, before
any of this clean power comes on line.
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Jim Lai /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: jwtlai@watcgl.waterloo.edu (Jim W Lai)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 20:40:49 GMT
Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario

In article <6722@bsu-cs.bsu.edu> dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Rahul Dhesi) writes:
>Er, no.  Mass disappears from the system as photons leave it.  If the
>system were perfectly insulated against all radiation and particle
>leakage, its mass could not change.
>Photons have mass.
 
From what I understand, photons are massless.  E = m c^2 only for
massed particles at rest.  The energy for a photon is: E = p c, where p
is momentum.  Mass is not conserved, only energy.
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Davin Yap /  Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
     
Originally-From: yap@me.utoronto.ca (Davin Yap)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
Date: 13 Apr 89 01:17:18 GMT
Organization: University of Toronto Mechanical Engineering

In article <524@megatek.UUCP> mark@megatek.UUCP () writes:
>So who wants to speculate on which big industrial concern will be the first
>to sell a commercial, ready to operate, fusion reactor to your friendly
>local electrical company? GE? General Atomic? Westinghouse? Somebody in
>France or Japan? Someone we have never heard of yet?
>
Atomic Energy Canada Ltd.  Why?  Take a CANDU reactor (there are a few,
very few, around ;-), yank out the uranium, and put paladium in it's place.
Voila, instant fusion power plant!  Granted, there are MANY technical
difficulties that make this impractical, but it was just a thought.  The
Germans also have a reactor that uses heavy water as the moderator, so
they could convert to fusion just as EASILY :^))).
 
On another note, has anyone given any thought to thermal pollution?  If
cheap fusion power were to come on-line, no doubt demand would increase,
perhaps many-fold.  What happens to all that waste heat from the
thousands of fusion power plants?  Combine that with the irreversible
green house effect, and Canada becomes a tropical paradise, California an
unliveable dessert.  Personally, I hate hot, humid weather so it looks
like I'm headed Anchorage way :-(.
 
Have to run - gonna plant a mango tree in my back yard!
 
Davin
--
They say, "The truth hurts".| Davin Yap, Mechanical Engineering, U of Toronto
So does pain.  I LIKE pain! |  yap@me.toronto.edu     yap@me.utoronto.bitnet
Why don't I like the truth? |        ...{pyramid,uunet}!utai!utme!yap
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Robert Woodhead /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: trebor@biar.UUCP (Robert J Woodhead)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 13:47:52 GMT
Organization: Biar Games, Inc.

In article <6722@bsu-cs.bsu.edu> dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Rahul Dhesi) writes:
>Photons have mass.
 
Er, gee, back when I was a lad, they taught me that photons are massless
particles, and that because they don't have mass, they can travel at the
speed of light [eg:particles with mass can approach c, but not reach it,
particles without mass _must_ travel at c].
 
Wouldn't it be more correct to say that the energy in a photon is equivalent
to mass.  I vaugely remember someone estimating it at e=m*c*c, or somesuch.
 
Then again, what with all the "Heavy Water" being bandied about in these
parts, who am I to object to a few "Heavy Photons"?  ;^)
--
* Robert J Woodhead * ``Spring Forward, Fall Back''.  Another one of the  *
* uunet!biar!trebor * 23 reasons why taking a flying leap at a brick wall *
* Biar Games, Inc.  * is not a very good idea.                            *
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudentrebor cudfnRobert cudlnWoodhead cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / L Hutchinson /  My theory.  By Ann Elk.  Ahemm Ahemm..
     
Originally-From: larryh@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Larry Hutchinson)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: My theory.  By Ann Elk.  Ahemm Ahemm..
Date: 12 Apr 89 20:32:22 GMT
Organization: Tektronix Inc., Beaverton, Or.

 
Net-people of the world arise!  The fate of science as we know it rests in
our hands.  Our task, should we choose to accept it, is to get to the
bottom of the P&F experiment.
 
It would seem to me that we have two choices: either (1) errors
are being made in the calorimetery or (2) something unknown to physics
is going on.
 
We have many people doing tremendous work on #2 what with MeV phonons and
3-body interactions and all.  I'd like to take this moment to thank you
for your effort.
 
I, however, consider the probability of #1 to be much higher than that of #2.
It's certainly not as much fun to think up ways that the experimenters may
have erred rather than to think about wild and weird physics but I think it is
likely to be much more productive in the long run.  Following is my
attempt to find sources of error in the calorimetry.
 
 
In any calorimetric experiment that involves continuous heat production
(whether from an unknown source or from a calibration heater) there exists an
equilibrim between heat production and heat loss.  (Otherwise the experiment
will overheat.)
 
When a calibration heater is used, the amount of heat production is known
with considerable accuracy. One can also make fairly accurate measurements
of the temperature of the cell and of the surrounding water bath.  From this
information we can accurately calculate the heat thermal resistance of
the cell.
 
But now we need to measure the heat production of the unknown source.  If
we can assume that the thermal resistance remains the same when we switch
over to the unknown source then we can accurately measure the unknown rate of
heat production.
 
I think the researchers may be making this assumption and I think that this
is a good place to look for errors.  One possibility that comes
to mind (mine at least) is that the electrolysis reaction produces lots
of bubbles of oxygen and perhaps deuterium gas.  If these bubbles coat
the walls of the glass cell then the thermal resistance will increase and
this will cause the temperature  in the cell to rise above that which would
exist in the absence of gas bubbles.
 
Question: Would this be a large enough effect?
Possible Ans:  Yes - if the apparatus was poorly designed.
 
A properly designed apparatus might utilize a large and constant thermal
resistance in series with the possibly variable one in order to swamp the
variations.
 
What I would really like to see is a detailed write-up on the experiment
(either P&F or Texas A&M) showing the actual geometry and calculations used.
Clearly though, the actual experiment can only be more complex than what I
assumed above.  If corrections have to be made due to evaporation loss,
energy that goes into the electrolysis reaction etc. then there are even
more places for error.
 
I would also like to see the Texas A&M researchers do multiple runs including
control experiemnts using light water.  The experiments should be done
under double (or at least single) blind conditions.  Has anyone heard if
they have done any control experiments?
 
 
 
Larry Hutchinson, Tektronix, Inc. PO Box 500, MS 50-383, Beaverton, OR 97077
UUCP:   [uunet|ucbvax|decvax|hplabs]!tektronix!tekgvs!larryh
ARPA:   larryh%tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM@RELAY.CS.NET
CSNet:  larryh@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudenlarryh cudfnLarry cudlnHutchinson cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / John Logajan /  Re: Economic feasibility of cold fusion
     
Originally-From: logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Economic feasibility of cold fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 21:55:11 GMT
Organization: Network Systems Corp. Mpls MN

Mosur Mohan writes:
> 2. Energy generated (as heat) is 4 * energy input (electrical)
 
This is based on a specific physical size, and is known (claimed) to vary
considerably, increasing with increased volume.
 
> No, the oil companies aren't in any danger yet.
 
It's too early to say either way.
 
--
- John M. Logajan @ Network Systems; 7600 Boone Ave; Brooklyn Park, MN 55428  -
- ...rutgers!umn-cs!ns!logajan / logajan@ns.network.com / john@logajan.mn.org -
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudenlogajan cudfnJohn cudlnLogajan cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Thant Tessman /  Re: short-term economic impact of cold
     
Originally-From: thant@horus.SGI.COM (Thant Tessman)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: short-term economic impact of cold
Date: 13 Apr 89 02:08:54 GMT
Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc., Mountain View, CA

In article <138300001@silver>, bakerj@silver.bacs.indiana.edu writes:
>
> /* Written  2:16 pm  Apr  4, 1989 by lmb@vicom.COM in silver:alt.fusion */
> /* ---------- "short-term economic impact of cold " ---------- */
> In article <8111@polya.Stanford.EDU> ginsberg@polya.Stanford.EDU
(Matthew L. Ginsberg) writes:
 
[stuff deleted]
 
> =price of oil is going down in the future, they will all start pumping as
> =much as they can, as fast as they can.  And the price of oil will
> =drop immediately, not twenty years from now.
>
> No.  More oil output == less income - something the Saudis finally proved to
> the rest of OPEC last year.  Unless you can increase your production by
> 10X (which even the Saudis can't), $20 oil pays better than $2 oil.
>
 
On the whole this is true, because the price was so artifically high,  but
it's not true for the one company (or country) that manages to undercut
everyone else.  More production does mean more income.  That's why
the Saudis did it in the first place.
 
thant@sgi.com "make money, not war"
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudenthant cudfnThant cudlnTessman cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / David Battle /  Re: Archiving alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: battle@alphard.cs.utk.edu (David Battle)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Archiving alt.fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 02:14:21 GMT
Organization: CS Dept -- University of TN, Knoxville

In article <2703@tank.uchicago.edu> mss2@tank.uchicago.edu (Michael S. Schiffer) writes:
>Something I was wondering: is anyone saving the contents of this
>group for future reference?
 
I am keeping a complete archive of alt.fusion and sci.physics.  I believe
I have everything from the very first article posted to sci.physics on.
If it gets to be too much to keep on line, I may have to move it off to
magtape.  I may also try to archive all the ftp-able stuff mentioned in
some of the postings.
 
					-David L. Battle
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudenbattle cudfnDavid cudlnBattle cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / William Murphy /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: murphy@pur-phy (William J. Murphy)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 14:58:03 GMT
Organization: Purdue Univ. Physics Dept., W. Lafayette, IN

In article <6722@bsu-cs.bsu.edu> dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Rahul Dhesi) writes:
>In article <1263@ns.network.com> logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan) writes:
>>Mass disappears from the system as photons are created.  Every photon is born
>>at the death of mass.
>
>Er, no.  Mass disappears from the system as photons leave it.  If the
>system were perfectly insulated against all radiation and particle
>leakage, its mass could not change.
>
>Photons have mass.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Gee, If they have mass, then according to Relativity, then they can't
travel at the speed of light, then photons aren't light.
Get it right!  Photons are massless, but have energy and momentum.
 
Remember E^2 = p^2 * c^2 + m^2*c^4.
 
Bill Murphy
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudenmurphy cudfnWilliam cudlnMurphy cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / L Anthony /  Re: Cold Fusion
     
Originally-From: lanthony@sunybcs.uucp (Lawrence Anthony)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 04:02:51 GMT
Organization: SUNY/Buffalo Computer Science

In article <1989Apr12.172936.26015@cs.rochester.edu> dietz@cs.rochester.
du (Paul Dietz) writes:
>[...]  The H- ions are in the octahedral
>sites.  Band theory calculations support this, and the metal-hydrogen
>distance in PdH(x), 1.3 angstroms, is the sum of the radii of the H-
>and the metal in its maximum oxidation state. [...]
Since the lattice constant of Pd is 3.89 A, the distance from the
octahedral center to the (six) nearest Pd atoms would be half that
(1.95 A).  The figure of 1.3 A given above would then imply that
the H atom/ion is not at the exact center of the octahedral interstice
in the Pd crystal lattice.  Comments?
bitnet:		lanthony@sunybcs.bitnet
internet:	lanthony@cs.buffalo.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudenlanthony cudfnLawrence cudlnAnthony cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Scot Wilcoxon /  When did Age of Fusion start?
     
Originally-From: sewilco@datapg.MN.ORG (Scot E Wilcoxon)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: When did Age of Fusion start?
Date: 12 Apr 89 02:59:00 GMT
Organization: Data Progress, Minneapolis, MN

Reports are that the first P&S experiment used a cube which overheated
during the night.  This seems to have been the first fusion experiment
to significantly exceed break-even, although its effect was not
discovered until the following morning.
 
What date was the following morning?  I was wondering when was day 1
of year 1 AF (Anno Fusio, or Age of Fusion).
--
Scot E. Wilcoxon  sewilco@DataPg.MN.ORG    {amdahl|hpda}!bungia!datapg!sewilco
Data Progress 	 UNIX masts & rigging  +1 612-825-2607    uunet!datapg!sewilco
	I'm just reversing entropy while waiting for the Big Crunch.
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudensewilco cudfnScot cudlnWilcoxon cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Michael McClary /  Things I'd like to see.
     
Originally-From: michael@xanadu.COM (Michael McClary)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Things I'd like to see.
Date: 11 Apr 89 14:19:00 GMT
Organization: Xanadu Operating Company, Palo Alto, CA

Some things I'd like to see, and why:
 
I'd like to see the ratio of Li6 / Li7 used by F&P.
 
I'd like to see how the reaction is affected by a magnetic field.
 
I'd like to see the experiment done with a palladium single-crystal,
and examined for particle emission in preferred directions.
 
I'd like to see the enthalpy from a set of experiments with palladium
electrodes of identical shape and varying size, preferably spheres.
 
I'd like to see the particle emissions from a piece of palladium
"charged up" with D to the ragged edge, then bombarded with protons,
(and perhaps triterons, alphas, and He(3) nuclei) at a range of
energies near 2 MeV, and alphas at ranges up to the low twenties.
 
I'd like to see two pieces similarly "charged", then (carefully!)
brought into proximity.
 
I'd like to see how the particle output varies with time.  Is it
white noise, or a set of spikes?
 
I'd like to see analysis of true nuclear participating catalysis.  Say:
 
	D + X -> Y          (+ optional minor junk like gammas or mv2)
	D + Y -> Z          (+ ditto)
	Z     -> He(4) + X  (+ ditto)
 
Where X might be Pd, Li(???), O, Pt, or random impurities.
(Carbon cycle, anyone?)
 
(I'd also like to see a copy of the F&P paper, but that should be taken
care of in a couple days.)
 
Now to why.  (Long.)

The lithium isotope ratio is of obvious interest if the lithium is
participating in the reaction.  If the source is natural lithium,
it's about 12% Li(6).  If it's commercial, it's probably mostly Li(7).
If it's from a handy piece of bomb-grade lithium deuteride, it's
probably mostly Li(6).
 
The reactions seem to start when the D concentration is high enough
that some sites are occupied by two deuterons.  Up to that point,
you'd expect the mutual repulsion of the deuterons to keep them well
spread out.  Once they're starting to cohabit, you'd expect them to
pair up with their magnetic moments opposite, resulting in an
attraction.  Constrain their orientation with an imposed field,
and they'll repel.  The difference would be small compared to the
coulomb barrier, but even a tiny difference should change the
tunneling rates.  If D-D fusion by tunneling is part of the
mechanism, this should modulate it.
 
The reports of small amounts of tritium, neutrons, and gammas
(consistent with small amounts of D-D fusion), combined with large
amounts of excess heat and He(4) make me suspect two or more reactions
are taking place: D + D -> (He(3) + n, H(3) +H(1)) providing the
initial excitation for something else that ends up with He(4) and
self-catalyzes once ignited.
 
The fragments of the F&P paper and reports from those attending the
news conferences and seminars give me the impression that heat output
per unit volume is affected by the macroscopic shape of the electrode,
and goes up with electrode size.  One explanation for this would be
action at a more-than-nuclear scale, such as a chain reaction.
 
I also get the impression that the reaction rate is spiky.  Another
indicator of a chain reaction.
 
This leads me to wonder how ordinary D-D fusion could start a
chain reaction of a different nuclear process.
 
Consider the electrode:  Polycrystalline palladium, deuterium,
possibly lithium, possibly other impurities.  But the deuterium
was forced in under an electrical pressure equivalent to 10**26
atmospheres.  The sea of electrons from the palladium's metallic
bond might help to suppress the coulomb barrier a bit, and the
surrounding Pd nuclei confine the Ds to small neighborhoods.
Fertile ground for an occasional spontaneous fusion.
 
But once it happens, you've got a proton, charge and all, ripping
through an extremely dense crystal of Pd and D at a couple MeV.
That's getting all your ducks in a row (then firing down the row)
with a vengance.
 
(Try standing in a military graveyard sometime.  Practically any
direction you look, the tombstones line up.  A crystal is the same
thing in 3-D)
 
Hit another pair of deuterons and you've got your three-body
reaction.  He(4) out, with the incoming particle or a neighboring
Pd fencepost to eat the excess momentum, and TWO charged particles
flying around (splitting 20-odd MeV between them) to do it over
again.
 
Or you could knock a D into a Li, Pd, or random impurity, and
perhaps have enough momentum left to do it again, maybe several
times over.  (Maybe you get to take some of the binding energy
away on the recoil.  That lets you keep it up until you leave
the electrode.)  Do that twice to the same target to get He(4)
at 20+ MeV (keeping the chain growing) plus the original target
back (intermediate state energies and transitions permitting).
Use a Li(6) and get a couple high-energy He(4)s after one shot.
 
Meanwhile, back at the original site, you also had a T going the
other way.  (Or perhaps the two particles were a He(3) and a
possibly insignificant n.)
 
Another possibility comes to mind:  The field from the passing
charged particle could repel the Pd, putting the squeeze on many
more active sites.  (I recall something like that being suggested
already.)  If so, fusion in these could produce additional squeezing,
setting up a fusion-inducing shock wave analogous to star formation
by supernova shocks in galactic gas clouds.  (Again you could get a
3 body interaction, removing the need to balance momentum by taking
the 3-and-1 low road.)
 
Another:  A billiard shot bonking a lone D off at an angle down
another row of sites occupied by Ds, with enough energy to get
it through the coulomb barrier.
 
Still another:  Would protons, triterons, He(3), and/or He(4)
be emitted in preferred directions, or guided by the lattice,
magnifying their effectiveness?
 
How about acoustic wave interference from multiple fusion events
descended from a common starter?
 
What are the electrons doing?  (The number of things that can
happen in a crystal is boggling.)
 
Implications:

If it IS a cascade, you get to control the fusion reaction using
the techniques already developed for fission, in addition to
electrical control of the reactant concentration and possible
magnetic modulation.  (But in a much smaller and cleaner package.)
 
Particle beams emerging in preferred directions from single crystals,
in addition to the window they'd provide on the physics, would have
implications for additional reaction rate control, lighter shielding,
and energy extraction.
 
Disclaimer:
I'm not a physicist, and may be talking through my hat.  Corrections
from real physicists are welcomed.
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenmichael cudfnMichael cudlnMcClary cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszL cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Joe Buck /  Re: Georgia Institute of Technology Partially Replicates P & F
     
Originally-From: jbuck@epimass.EPI.COM (Joe Buck)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Georgia Institute of Technology Partially Replicates P & F
Date: 12 Apr 89 03:17:15 GMT
Organization: Entropic Processing, Inc., Cupertino, CA

In article <6962@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney) writes:
>(On an unrelated topic, can anyone tell me why the decay of a neutron
>into a proton and electron would require rewriting quantum physics?  I
>was under the impression it was a known decay reaction.  I don't know
>whether it releases or requires energy, though.  [Oh, all right: "I
>don't know if it's exothermic or endothermic".  You write so people can
>understand you and instead they assume you don't know anything.])
 
Yes, neutrons decay into protons and electrons (and a neutrino as
well, or was that an antineutrino?), with a half-life of around 1000
seconds (20 minutes or so).  The reaction is exothermic.  The inverse
reaction occurs when a star is collapsing into a neutron star
(electrons combining with protons to form neutrons).
 
Now if someone suggested we aren't seeing neutrons in F&P because neutron
decay is accelerated somehow, THAT would require new physics.
 
--
-- Joe Buck	jbuck@epimass.epi.com, uunet!epimass.epi.com!jbuck
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudenjbuck cudfnJoe cudlnBuck cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Joe Buck /  Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
     
Originally-From: jbuck@epimass.EPI.COM (Joe Buck)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
Date: 12 Apr 89 03:20:00 GMT
Organization: Entropic Processing, Inc., Cupertino, CA

In article <524@megatek.UUCP> mark@megatek.UUCP () writes:
>So who wants to speculate on which big industrial concern will be the first
>to sell a commercial, ready to operate, fusion reactor to your friendly
>local electrical company? GE? General Atomic? Westinghouse? Somebody in
>France or Japan? Someone we have never heard of yet?
 
It will not be a big US firm; they are all too inflexible.  If scaling
the process up is extremely expensive, the French have a shot with a big
government-subsidized program, or the Japanese.  If it's not so expensive,
a new US company funded by venture capitalists is a possible candidate.
 
In short: how the hell could I know? :-)
 
 
 
 
--
-- Joe Buck	jbuck@epimass.epi.com, uunet!epimass.epi.com!jbuck
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudenjbuck cudfnJoe cudlnBuck cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.04 / Mosur Mohan /  Economic feasibility of cold fusion
     
Originally-From: mosurm@mntgfx.mentor.com (Mosur Mohan)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Economic feasibility of cold fusion
Date: 4 Apr 89 22:30:44 GMT
Organization: Mentor Graphics Corporation, Beaverton Oregon

Just did a little calculating, and it wasn't awfully promising.
 
Hypothesis:
1. Cold fusion works
2. Energy generated (as heat) is 4 * energy input (electrical)
   (This is the impression I get from various sources ==> maybe just
    rumour, for all I know!  Anyway...)
 
Assume we put in X amount of energy, and get 4X as output, i.e., a
gain of 3X.
 
Well, how does one use the heat energy from cold fusion?  About the
only way I can think of is to to boil water to run a turbine to
generate electricity; at least, until someone invents a pocket
reactor.  Efficiency of conversion of thermal to electrical energy is
what, 40% max?  So, take the 3X gain and multiply by 0.4 ==> 1.2X
 
One final detail: how much does Palladium, Tritium and Heavy water
cost to purify?  Less than the remaining 1.2X margin?  If so, then
yes, you have economically feasible fusion.  But my gut feeling
tells me that, even assuming hypothesis 1 above, hypothesis 2 needs
much work and improvement.
 
No, the oil companies aren't in any danger yet.
 
 
--
-- Mohan.   {uunet!mntgfx!mosurm}
            {Mosur Mohan, Mentor Graphics, Beaverton, OR}
 -----------------------------------------------------------
"Cogito ergo sum"  ==>  "I think, therefore I add."
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 /  pierce@lanai.c /  Mishaps
     
Originally-From: pierce@lanai.cs.ucla.edu
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Mishaps
Date: 11 Apr 89 21:27:42 GMT
Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department

I can't personally confirm or deny the following details, but I would
be interested in hearing from anyone who can. ( Although I'd prefer a
bit more than why such and such is "impossible". ) As I understand from
reading:
 
   1.  The B-52 mishap in Spain involved 4 bombs, two of which burst
       on impact. 1966
 
   2.  January 24, 1961. North Carolina USA.  Prior to crashing, a B-52
       jettisoned two bombs, one of which burst on impact.  According
       to some accounts, the other nearly detonated with 5 of 6 safety
       switches not able to withstand impact.  The plutonium was not
       recovered.
 
   3.  The silo mishap involved a Titan II missile in Arkansas, USA
       in 1980.  Apparently it exploded and went flying a couple of
       hundred meters away. Fortunately, the warhead did not detonate.
       2 killed, 22 injured in the incident.
 
Two related popular references about such matters are:
 
   New York Times, May 3, 1987: Peter Lewis, "Risks Are Growing in A-War
      Systems"
 
   Parade, October 18, 1981: Jack Anderson, "Are We Safe From Our Own
      Nuclear Weapons?"
 
-- Brad
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Rahul Dhesi /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Rahul Dhesi)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 04:14:22 GMT
Organization: CS Dept, Ball St U, Muncie, Indiana

In article <1263@ns.network.com> logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan) writes:
>Mass disappears from the system as photons are created.  Every photon is born
>at the death of mass.
 
Er, no.  Mass disappears from the system as photons leave it.  If the
system were perfectly insulated against all radiation and particle
leakage, its mass could not change.
 
Photons have mass.
 
Other than this minor detail, you are correct about the conversion of
matter (not mass) to energy.
--
Rahul Dhesi <dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu>
UUCP:    ...!{iuvax,pur-ee}!bsu-cs!dhesi
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudendhesi cudfnRahul cudlnDhesi cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Michael Brooks /  Re: Things I'd like to see.
     
Originally-From: brooks@Portia.Stanford.EDU (Michael Brooks)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Things I'd like to see.
Date: 12 Apr 89 06:12:34 GMT
Organization: Stanford University

Distribution:
Organization: Stanford University
Kfusion, muonsyword
 
In reply to <faOa1#mXwrX-michael@xanadu.com> <michael@xanadu.UUUP>
(Michael McClary):
I`d like to drag back into the discussion the seminar synposis authored
by Douglas R. O. Morrison and posted on the net in the past by
interested parties.  A brief discussion of muon catalyzed fusion is
given wherein the prescence of a high energy muon can induce a decrease
in proximity of already closely spaced Ds or H3s leading to the rxn.
In the densely packed Pd + D lattice you describe it seems that all that
is needed is a high energy triggering event by a random cosmic ray,
leading eventually to a high energy muon. The reduction in coulombic
repulsion due to electron screening would thus aid this process of
"cosmic catalysis", if not increase qm tunneling probabilities, (which
still may be rather low, though not negligible).  In any event, once
the initial event occurs, as you pointed out, some cascade mechanism
might be set into motion---a cold chain reaction!  Given the nature of
what nuclear processes seem to be going on, plus the fact that fusion
ceases when current is stopped, this "chain reaction" would of the self
limited variety, implying slower propagation of triggering particles
(and/or production of same). Still and all some interesting ideas,
thanks.
An additional comment: calorimetry is irritatingly difficult to do, and
if you have ever spent any time with an oxygen bomb calorimeter you know
what I am talking about.  It`s very gratifying to see Georgia Tech
come up with neutron and tritium detection.  To be blunt: heat is one
thing---but neutrons, gammas, and H3 (betas) imply a multiplicty of
of nuclear processes, not chemical.  It may be some time before very
careful calorimetry data becomes available.  The most important aspect
of the phenomena seems to be on much firmer ground now.  Let`s see
some more!
 
 
Michael Brooks, Solid State Electronics Lab,
Stanford U. MCCullough Hall RM106, SU., CA 94305
"Details, details, just bother me with details!"
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cuddy12 cudenbrooks cudfnMichael cudlnBrooks cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Jon Singer /  Re: At the Crossroads
     
Originally-From: jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: At the Crossroads
Date: 12 Apr 89 07:30:34 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA

 
In his recent posting, <18d.01cC7U1010jJZgs@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com>,
Mike Taylor mentions that heating the Palladium sample in vacuo
causes the effects to start much more quickly than they do otherwise.
 
This seems neat to me.
 
Mike invokes it as a possible explanation of why Pons and Fleischman
didn't see neutrons during the first 8 hours of their experiment. I
think that may be partly reasonable.
 
But my original question was, really, why don't P&F see anything early
on, when _the_BYU_people_ONLY_see_stuff_early_on_?
 
I can't accept the notion that because P&F didn't heat their sample,
they had a late start on the neutrons, when BYU didn't heat theirs
either. I STILL wanna know why P&F didn't see anything at the start of
their runs, when BYU did.
 
Anybody have any other ideas?
 
Cheers!
jon
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jon Singer is (feel free	|
to fill in the blank any way	|	Trigons! I must have trigons!
you wish to, ok?), and		|	Igor, find a trigon shop for me!
is also jon@Apple.COM		|
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudenjon cudfnJon cudlnSinger cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Jon Singer /  WHY HAVEN'T WE SEEN THIS MATERIAL BEFORE???
     
Originally-From: jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: WHY HAVEN'T WE SEEN THIS MATERIAL BEFORE???
Date: 12 Apr 89 09:21:52 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc., Cupertino, CA

The following material is taken from The WELL, from the Science
conference, Topic 86 of which is clearly Cold Fusion. I saw it
posted on the wall of someone's cube here at work.
 
Looks like the network is not quite as well connected as it might be,
since this material is now TWO AND A HALF WEEKS OLD.
 
============================================================
 
Topic 86: Cold Fusion # 9: Jeff Farmer (jeffbo)
Sat, Mar 25, '89 (06:29) 15 lines
 
I have a friend who is a grad student in Chemistry here at
Texas A&M; he and others in his lab got the news yesterday
and proceeded to whip out some palladium and heavy H2O and
try the thing.  Their heavy water boiled immediately,
verifying the energy output.  Apparently several other things
have to be checked in order to verify that it is fusion that
is actually taking place.  My friend says that the point of
the process is that the pressure of hydrogen inside palladium
is higher than the pressure required for fusion.  He says
that the claimed energy output to input ratio is 4/1.  I
can't recall being as excited about something since the
first moon landing.  If this is real, it is really big.  The
process also supposedly produces high-energy neutrons.  The
implication is that anyone with access to palladium and
heavy water can build a pretty nasty neutron device.
Advances in science cut both ways...
 
 
Topic 86: Cold Fusion # 15: Jeff Farmer (jeffbo)
Sun, Mar 26, '89 (12:30) 30 lines
 
I've talked in more detail to my source in the Texas A&M
Chemistry Dept. where an attempt is being made right now to
verify this report.  Everything here is tentative.  A
current was run through heavy water using a palladium
electrode. The potential was begun at one volt and run up to
ten. At about 9.5 volts the current started "taking off".
Heat was generated, boiling the D2O.  According to the
preliminary calculations, the heat out was about 2.5 times
the electrical energy in.  An attempt is being made now to:
 
--Run a control reaction with regular H2O as a check for a
possible chemical(as opposed to nuclear) reaction.
 
--Set up an apparatus to increase the voltage past ten
volts.
 
--Use a calorimeter for a more accurate calculation of the
energy liberated.
 
--Alter the D+ concentration to see if this has any effect
on the reaction.
 
According to theoretical calculations, the possible output
ratio is about 4 to one for the Helium plus neutron reaction
and a bit less for the tritium plus proton reaction. Right
now no claim of verification can be made.  They hope to have
something definite by next week.  If they get anything I
will post it.
 
==============================================================
 
I don't quite know what to think. I also haven't read the rest
of the Topic - I found it very heavy going, nowhere near as easy
as reading netnews. (The conferencing system on The WELL, called
PicoSpan (I think that's a registered trademark or something, so
tm if appropriate, or (r) if that's right), is rather different
from rn in some regards...) In any case, I did see various items
from netnews quoted there, so I figure it's ok to return the
favor.
 
Meanwhile, it sure looks to me like Jeffbo's buddy in Texas has
gotten the results reasonably confirmed, and I am not sure I
want to know why they were announced by someone other than a
graduate student...
 
 
				- Jon Singer
 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jon Singer is (feel free	|
to fill in the blank any way	|	Trigons! I must have trigons!
you wish to, ok?), and		|	Igor, find a trigon shop for me!
is also jon@Apple.COM		|
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudenjon cudfnJon cudlnSinger cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / L Chiaraviglio /  Is (1)H + (1)H --> (n)He possible?  (was Re: Cold fusion in 1926...)
     
Originally-From: chiaravi@silver.bacs.indiana.edu (Lucius Chiaraviglio)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Is (1)H + (1)H --> (n)He possible?  (was Re: Cold fusion in 1926...)
Date: 12 Apr 89 09:03:58 GMT
Organization: Department of Biology at Indiana University, Bloomington

In article <1989Apr11.195148.6341@cs.rochester.edu> yamauchi@cs.rocheste
.edu (Brian Yamauchi) writes:
>Well, is
>
>	H + H --> He
>
>a possible quantum fusion reaction?
>
>(No wonder the neutron count was so low..... :-)
 
	The people doing the fusion experiments didn't have much (1)H in their
setups, except for when they did the (1)H controls, in which case nothing
happened as far as I have heard.  However, in the cases where they had mostly
(2)H (deuterium) they usually had a small amount of (1)H present as a
contaminant, and this could make possible reactions like
 
	(1)H + (2)H --> (3)He + gamma ray
 
where heat is also present in the form of high velocity of the (3)He
(recoiling from emission of the gamma ray).
 
	Other than that, you can't get from (1)H to (3)He or (4)He in one
step.  _Scientific American_ had an article a LONG time ago (out for a long
time in at least one of its Offprints -- I think _Readings in Astronomy_, in
the section on our Solar System) about the fusion processes taking place in
the sun.  It listed a WHOLE BUNCH of pathways starting at (1)H and ending up
with (4)He.  These are variously responsible for producing deuterium ((2)H),
(3)He, lithium (both isotopes), beryllium, and boron as intermediates, but
pathways producing the latter three elements are minor pathways, and all of
these pathways tend to destroy these intermediates as fast as they form them,
so that large amounts of these elements never accumulate.  Another pathway
generates none of these elements as intermediates, but rather uses carbon as
a catalyst in a cycle which requires temperatures of about 20 billion degrees
to occur at a significant rate (at the time of writing of the article in the
late 1960's or early 1970's the core of the sun was thought to be marginally
hot enough for this -- I don't know if this opinion has been revised either
way in light of better data).
 
	In the sets of pathways given below, all reactions are exothermic
unless otherwise noted.  To reduce clutter, the (positive) charges of atomic
nuclei are not shown.  At least I can remember the major pathway and a couple
of minor subpathways correctly, although I can't remember quantitative values
of energies for each reaction (this will have to wait for some poster(s) with
better memories or with copies of the article in front of them):
 
	1:	(1)H + (1)H <--> (2)He
		((2)He is unstable; also, the reaction as read from
		left to right is endothermic.  At sufficiently high
		temperatures a small amount of (2)He will be present
		in hydrogen plasma; however, it can never accumulate
		beyond a small fraction of the total mass of the gas.
		If an electron gets trapped between the 2 (1)H's,
		the following exothermic minor reaction occurs:
 
		1a:	(1)H + e(-) + (1)H --> (2)H + neutrino
 
		which bypasses reaction #2 below.)
 
	2:	(2)He --> (2)H + e(+) + neutrino
		(Occasionally this happens before the (2)He breaks
		back down into 2 (1)H -- because it is rare, fusion
		of (1)H is very slow, which is why you can't use it
		as a fusion bomb fuel, and at least one reason why
		it doesn't do much in controlled fusion
		experiments.)
 
	3:	(2)H + (1)H --> (3)He + gamma ray
		(This happens much more often than reactions of
		(2)H with (2)H because much more (1)H is present
		than (2)H.)
 
	4:	(3)He + (3)He --> (4)He + 2 (1)H
		(Since the common occurrence of reaction #3 occurs
		more often than most, and since (3)He cannot be
		consumed by direct reaction with (1)H, (3)He is one
		of the more common reaction intermediates, and thus
		gets more chances to react with other (3)He than with
		(2)H, although
 
		4a:	(3)He + (2)H --> (4)He + (1)H
 
		can also occur.)
 
	Lithium, beryllium, and boron can be generated by reactions in which
(4)He itself takes part, although the (4)He is always regenerated when the
former 3 elements are consumed.  These reactions are pretty complicated (and a
lot of them exist); I don't want to try without the article in front of me, so
I'll leave this to people with better memories and/or copies of the article.
 
	However, I do remember the carbon-catalyzed pathway except for
quantitative values of energies, so I'll post it.  Note that it produces
nitrogen and oxygen but uses them up again, so that large amounts do not
accumulate.
 
	1:	(12)C + (1)H --> (13)N + gamma ray
 
	2:	(13)N --> (13)C + e(+) + neutrino
 
	3:	(13)C + (1)H --> (14)N + gamma ray
 
	4:	(14)N + (1)H --> (15)O + gamma ray
 
	5:	(15)O --> (15)N + e(+) + neutrino
 
	6:	(15)N + (1)H --> (12)C + (4)He
		(Note that this regenerates the carbon.  I presume
		that this actually happens by the reactions
 
		6.1:	(15)N + (1)H --> (16)O*
 
		where the * indicates excitation to the breaking
		point, thus leading very rapidly to
 
		6.2:	(16)O* --> (12)C + (4)He
 
		but leaving the question of why the (16)O* doesn't
		lose its excitation by emission of a gamma ray
		a fair fraction of the time, thus leaving a
		permanent (16)O?)
 
	Since all of the above reactions are exothermic and produce
intermediates that do not fly apart immediately (except for #6 where it is
necessary for the (16)O* to fly apart immediately in order to complete the
reaction), the carbon cycle will be the dominant mode of (1)H fusion under
conditions where the average kinetic energy of nuclei is enough to overcome
Coulomb repulsion between (1)H and the heavier nuclei, provided that enough
carbon is present (apparently it doesn't take very much).  I would suppose
that an analogous set of reactions could occur using oxygen as a catalyst
under even higher temperatures (begin speculation -- I have never seen
the following):
 
	1:	(16)O + (1)H --> (17)F + gamma ray
 
	2:	(17)F --> (17)O + e(+) + neutrino
 
	3:	(17)O + (1)H --> (18)F + gamma ray
 
	4:	(18)F --> (18)O + e(+) + neutrino
 
	5:	(18)O + (1)H --> (19)F + gamma ray
 
	6:	(19)F + (1)H --> (16)O + (4)He
		(Analogous note to that for carbon cycle #6.)
 
	It also seems that Neon could serve as a catalyst under yet higher
temperatures, and so on up the atomic ladder, but since I'm already
speculating, and since the idea should be pretty obvious by now, I won't
enumerate these pathways.
 
--
|  Lucius Chiaraviglio   |  ARPA:  chiaravi@silver.bacs.indiana.edu
BITNET:  chiaravi@IUBACS.BITNET (IUBACS hoses From: fields; INCLUDE RET ADDR)
ARPA-gatewayed BITNET:      chiaravi%IUBACS.BITNET@vm.cc.purdue.edu
Alt ARPA-gatewayed BITNET:  chiaravi%IUBACS.BITNET@cunyvm.cuny.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Dennis Thurlow /  heavy water/alcohol
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: heavy water/alcohol
Date: 11 Apr 89 22:28:37 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC  S. Plainfield, NJ

>the right mixture of the two cancels the
>effect by balancing the density differences.
 
If the heavy water is harmless otherwise, and it diffuses into
the canal fast enough, there might be a commercial application here.
It wouldn't address response/reflex times unless... how about
coffee made with heavy water as an after drinks drink?
-nsscb!det
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Dennis Thurlow /  P&F result and frequency
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: P&F result and frequency
Date: 11 Apr 89 23:37:28 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC, S.Plainfield, NJ

>But, *what* carries off the energy?  If you make 4He from d+d, the
>helium nucleus cannot just fly off by itself -- that violates conservation
>of momentum.  There *is* a (d,gamma) reaction, but that cannot be
>the energy source P & F are seeing, because several watts of 23 MeV
>gamma rays would be very noticable (and moderately lethal).  23 MeV
>gammas would also make a reasonable number of photoneutrons.
>
>	Paul F. Dietz
 
Does anyone the natural frequency of Pd crystals? Does anyone know if
that frequency shifts during the charge period or once heat production
starts? What about harmonics (particularly low frequency ones)?
-nsscb!det
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Dennis Thurlow /  Cure for AIDS?
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Cure for AIDS?
Date: 11 Apr 89 23:50:34 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC  S. Plainfield, NJ

>My impression from reading this article is that deuterium is not particularly
>toxic, but you shouldn't drink it.  I'd be interested in knowing whether the
>anti-tumor effect has been fully investigated.  Who knows, it might be a
>treatment for AIDS.
 
More likely a cure for run-away mitosis (cancer).
Since mitosis is probably strongly regulated by concentrations of
certain molecules in the cellular fluid, which in turn is
the result of external environmental factors (my own
theory) altering that environment at a molecular level with
something that changes CH bond energies is bound (no pun intended)
to change the rate of mitosis.
-nsscb!det
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Randell Jesup /  Re: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
     
Originally-From: jesup@cbmvax.UUCP (Randell Jesup)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
Date: 12 Apr 89 04:33:20 GMT
Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA

In article <1916@hp-sdd.hp.com> hinojosa@hp-sdd.hp.com.UUCP (Daniel Hinojosa) writes:
>>Georgia Tech also confirmed the results today, in terms of neutrons.
>
>However Georgia Tech aslo did not have reports of excess heat generation.
>This is even more interesting how these two experiments show very
>different results. I would be interested to find how similar the
>set-ups were at the two locations.
 
	Georgia Tech did NOT do any calorimetry.  They ONLY measured neutrons
and tritium (as far as I know).  They did NOT test for heat.
 
--
Randell Jesup, Commodore Engineering {uunet|rutgers|allegra}!cbmvax!jesup
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 /  caulkins@cdp.U /  Re: Texas A&M confirms cold fusion?
     
Originally-From: caulkins@cdp.UUCP
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Texas A&M confirms cold fusion?
Date: 11 Apr 89 17:47:00 GMT

 
[Story in today's San Jose Mercury, evidently from the LA
Times:]
 
New Studies Strongly Back Fusion Claims
 
College Station, Texas
 
Scientists at Texas A&M University said Monday that they got up
to 80 % more energy out of a nuclear fusion experiment than
they put in ...
 
scientists from Georgia Institute of Technology announced just
hours later that they were getting strong evidence of fusion
from similar experiments ...
 
Charles R. Martin, an electro-chemist with Texas A&M, said
Monday that "we have confirmed" that more energy is produced by
a simple "electrochemical cell than is put into the cell."
 
"This is in agreement with the findings of Pons and
Fleischmann," he said.  "We have run the experiment using four
different amounts of electric current and have found that
excess energy varies between 60 % and 80 %." ...
 
researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology claimed
Monday to have detected neutrons and tritium ... "One of the
signatures of fusion is production of neutrons, so we felt that
if we could detect neutrons coming from this apparatus, that
would confirm fusion," said James Mahaffey, who led the
five-member Georgia Tech team. ...
 
Particularly puzzling in the Texas A&M work is that researchers
there found a net increase in energy almost immediately,
although Pons has said that it takes many days for the
apparatus to begin producing heat. ...
 
The three [Texas A&M] scientists said they are confident their
results will hold up under scrutiny because they used a
sophisticated system that ... directly and continuously
measures any temperature changes, showing how much energy is
going into the apparatus and how much is being produced, Martin
said.
 
The energy output, he said, "is rock-steady."
 
The apparatus used by the Texas team is almost identical to the
one used in Utah.  It consists of an electrode with a palladium
cylinder one millimeter in diameter and 5 centimeters long,
surrounded by a fine platinum gauze.  The electrode is immersed
in "heavy water" ...
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / pri=-10 Lynne /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: sl@van-bc.UUCP (pri=-10 Stuart Lynne)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 11 Apr 89 09:04:28 GMT
Organization: Wimsey Associates, Vancouver, BC.

In article <1989Apr10.202118.7831@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
}In article <11789@ut-emx.UUCP> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
}>But the real killer is that the only North American source of any size
}>is in *Canada*!  Next thing you know they'll be asking us to accept
}>that funny-looking money of theirs. :-)
 
}Nah, we'll take that drab green stuff of yours, in adequate quantities of
}course.  Special just for you, palladium at only $1000/ounce.
 
Henry, you missed the sales meeting. $1000/ounce is the price for
members of the Commonwealth. The US or Nato price is $1100/ounce.
 
:-) (-:
 
--
Stuart.Lynne@wimsey.bc.ca uunet!van-bc!sl 604-937-7532(voice) 604-939-4768(fax)
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Norm Strong /  Re: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
     
Originally-From: strong@tc.fluke.COM (Norm Strong)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Hiding stuff with patents (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
Date: 11 Apr 89 15:53:36 GMT
Organization: John Fluke Mfg. Co., Inc., Everett, WA

}In article <6903@hoptoad.uucp>, tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney) writes:
}>
}> Not even that long.  All patents are public.  Anyone can buy a copy for
}> a dollar.  You can't hide something that's patented, period.
 
"Patent" means "open".  Many people believe that the purpose of patents is to
grant the inventor a 17 year exclusive on his invention.  I fact, the 17 year
exclusive is the price the public pays for knowledge of the invention.  In
return for the 17 years, the patentee must disclose the best known realization
of his invention.  If he withholds anything, the patent is invalid.
 
--
 
Norm   (strong@tc.fluke.com)
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Joe Dellinger /  Re: WHY HAVEN'T WE SEEN THIS MATERIAL BEFORE???
     
Originally-From: joe@hanauma.stanford.edu (Joe Dellinger)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: WHY HAVEN'T WE SEEN THIS MATERIAL BEFORE???
Date: 12 Apr 89 13:08:44 GMT
Organization: Stanford University, Dept. of Geophysics

Simple! There are simply no netnews sites at Texas A+M. Looking
at the maps, I see one UUCP site listed, but it has no uucp or
netnews connections! I know people in the Physics department there,
and they are entirely a VAX/VMS shop, like all the other departments
I know of there. Some computers have BITNET connections. I've been
using that to send the most interesting stuff I've culled off the net
to a friend in the Physics dept there. He does read mail I send to him,
but as (I think) nobody there knows how to send mail out on the network,
it's strictly a ``one-way'' link.
 
Despite their lack of computer expertise, the Physics dept there is
pretty impressive. They were a big reason Dallas got the SSC.
(PS: Texas A+M is not near Dallas, Houston, or any other large city.)
\    /\    /\    /\/\/\/\/\/\/\.-.-.-.-.......___________
 \  /  \  /  \  /Dept of Geophysics, Stanford University \/\/\.-.-....___
  \/    \/    \/Joe Dellinger joe@hanauma.stanford.edu  apple!hanauma!joe\/\.-._
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Steve Masticola /  Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
     
Originally-From: masticol@paul.rutgers.edu (Steve Masticola)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
Date: 12 Apr 89 13:28:15 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.

> So who wants to speculate on which big industrial concern will be the first
> to sell a commercial, ready to operate, fusion reactor to your friendly
> local electrical company?
 
Not a company but a consortium: MITI, Japan. The member companies have
the bucks and the commitment to back the decade or two of R&D it'll
take to bring fusion to market. Japan has had fusion energy as a
national priority for some time, since the country is basically
energy-penniless and thus at the mercy of OPEC. And they've done it
before with technology originating in the U.S. So they're capable,
motivated, and have a track record.
 
Who is first is irrelevant; if fusion can become a major energy
source, international patent agreements are wastepaper. It's simply
too valuable and apparently not difficult to reproduce.
 
- Steve.
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Steve Simmons /  Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
     
Originally-From: scs@vax3.iti.org (Steve Simmons)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Fusion Experiment Replication
Date: 12 Apr 89 14:52:53 GMT
Organization: Industrial Technology Institute

In article <10177@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU> ttwang@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Thomas Wang) writes:
>Hopefully one can answer the chemical vs nuclear question by running a control
>experiment.  By replacing D2O with H2O, and still getting the same heat
>output would imply chemical process.  If the control experiment produces no
>heat, then nuclear process would be more likely.
 
Not necessarily.  If you get the same heat output you've merely indicated
that (1)H vs. (2)H doesn't make a difference.  The mechanism will remain
undetermined.
 
   Steve Simmons         Just another midwestern boy
   scs@vax3.iti.org  -- or -- ...!sharkey!itivax!scs
         "Hey...you *can* get here from here!"
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Mark Thorson /  Re: deuterium harmful?
     
Originally-From: mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Re: deuterium harmful?
Date: 12 Apr 89 05:10:16 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

In addition to facts I mentioned in the previous posting, the SA article
said the largest animal which had been deuterated up to that time was
a small dog.
 
The article also mentioned that the ill effects of deuterium are reversible.
Since one of the main effects of deuteration is sterility in males, and only
low levels are required, this could be the male birth control pill!!
 
The severe effects, such as death, occur at about 35% deuteration.  That
means 35% of your bodily fluids are heavy.  I don't know if thats by
weight or by mole.
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 /  James_J_Kowalc /  Re: deuterium harmful?
     
Originally-From: James_J_Kowalczyk@cup.portal.com
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Re: deuterium harmful?
Date: 12 Apr 89 06:31:05 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

I was told at one time that D2O is harmful because if it replaces a
significant amount of water in a biological system many enzymatic
pathways that involve proton abstractions, transfers, etc., will have
to involve deuteron abstractions, transfers, etc.  Since deuterium is
approximately twice as heavy as protium, these chemical reactions will
be significantly slower with deuterium due to "isotope effects."
 
This sounds reasonable to me (as a chemist, not a biologist), but I
also think that a person would have to ingest large amounts of D2O
over a prolonged period in order to build up lethal concentrations of
D2O in the body.
 
By the way, D2O tasted just like H2O to me. :-)
Jim Kowalczyk
 Kowalczyk@chemistry.utah.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / John Nagle /  Re: The first company will be...
     
Originally-From: jbn@glacier.STANFORD.EDU (John B. Nagle)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: The first company will be...
Date: 12 Apr 89 14:21:10 GMT
Organization: Stanford University

 
     Mitsushibi Heavy Industries.
 
					John Nagle
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Steven Jacobs /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: jacobs%cmos.utah.edu@wasatch.utah.edu (Steven R. Jacobs)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 14:32:21 GMT
Organization: University of Utah CS Dept

In article <6722@bsu-cs.bsu.edu> dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Rahul Dhesi) writes:
>In article <1263@ns.network.com> logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan) writes:
>>Mass disappears from the system as photons are created.  Every photon is born
>>at the death of mass.
>
>Er, no.  Mass disappears from the system as photons leave it.  If the
>system were perfectly insulated against all radiation and particle
>leakage, its mass could not change.
>
>Photons have mass.
>
>Other than this minor detail, you are correct about the conversion of
>matter (not mass) to energy.
 
Er, no.  Photons do *NOT* have mass.  They could not travel
at the speed of light if they did have mass.  Photons are
pure energy.  The (E = mc^2) formula is a relationship
between mass and energy, and it *DOES* represent a conversion
of mass (not matter) to energy (mass and energy are two forms
of the same "thing").
 
Conversion of matter to energy would imply that particles are
being consumed in the process, and this is simply not correct.
 
John was correct to begin with.  Other than this minor detail, ...
:-)
 
I
N
E
W
S
 
f
o
d
d
e
r
 
 
Steve Jacobs  ({ihnp4,decvax}!utah-cs!jacobs, jacobs@cs.utah.edu)
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / David Matuszek /  Re: Neutron counts
     
Originally-From: dave@emerald.PRC.Unisys.COM (David Lee Matuszek)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Neutron counts
Date: 12 Apr 89 13:12:36 GMT
Organization: Unisys Corporation, Paoli Research Center; Paoli, PA

In article <1844@wpi.wpi.edu> lfoard@wpi.wpi.edu (Lawrence C Foard) writes:
 
>
>A good science fiction story:
  [first story omitted]
>
>Or:
> Life that has evolved to use cold fusion, and eventually moves out into
>interstellar space munching up gas and dust as it finds it.
>
Uh...you may be describing humanity.
-- Dave Matuszek (dave@prc.unisys.com)
-- Unisys Corp. / Paoli Research Center / PO Box 517 / Paoli PA  19301
-- Standard disclaimer:  Any resemblance between my opinions and those of my
   employer is strictly coincidental.
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Emmett Black /  Soviet Scientists replicate fusion experiment
     
Originally-From: blackje@sunspot.steinmetz (Emmett Black)
Newsgroups: crd.fusion,sci.physics,alt.fusion,misc.headlines
Subject: Soviet Scientists replicate fusion experiment
Date: 12 Apr 89 16:14:14 GMT
Organization: GE Research; Schenectady, NY  12345

National Public Radio just carried an item in which the Soviet
News Agency has reported that scientists at Moscow University
have duplicated the "cold fusion" experiment.
 
Details were sketchy, and mostly indicated that they passed a
current through a "palladium wire" ... no names were given, and
most importantly, NPR did not indicate WHICH cold fusion experiment
(UoU or BYU) was duplicated....
 
Still seeking details ... film at 11.
 
 
 
 
--Emmett
	J.E.Black; GE Research/K1-3C26; Schenectady, NY 12345
	blackje@crd.ge.com;   ...!uunet!steinmetz!crd!blackje
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Dennis Thurlow /  Commentary on Usefullness of Networks
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Commentary on Usefullness of Networks
Date: 11 Apr 89 23:31:24 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC  S. Plainfield, NJ

>dww@stl.stc.co.uk <or>  ...uunet!mcvax!ukc!stl!dww <or>  PSI%234237100122::DWW
>Usenet works on the principle that 10,000 people know more about the answer to
>any question than one does.  Unfortunately they know 10,000 different answers.
 
However most answers involve more than one component. Tabulate the
components and take everything with-in the first standard deviation,
and odds are you will at least be working in the right direction.
 
Ideas trigger ideas.
 
There is safety in a multitude of council.
 
I'll take the 10,000 answers, thank you.
 
-nsscb!det
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Dennis Thurlow /  Earth
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Earth
Date: 12 Apr 89 00:01:01 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC  S. Plainfield, NJ

>A good science fiction story:
> Make a big drop (24 thousand miles across) of Heavy water, put some life on
>it and drop a big chunk of palladium in, The inside of the planet should have
>a nice blue glow, then send it out into intergalactic space. Self heating and
>lighting planet.
 
Or just lump a big enough ball of stuff together and let gravity sort
it all out. The Earth is not finished yet, you know. It's still forming.
The core is a huge iron crystal, and it's probably growing.
(Of course, I couold be wrong. I've been wrong before.)
-nsscb!det
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Scot Wilcoxon /  Future Fusion Announcements
     
Originally-From: sewilco@datapg.MN.ORG (Scot E Wilcoxon)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Future Fusion Announcements
Date: 12 Apr 89 03:18:37 GMT
Organization: Data Progress, Minneapolis, MN

My guesses on future fusion events:
 
1. UofU and BYU experiments will be duplicated. (UofU estimate of
several months, but two partial duplications were reported 89/04/10)
 
2. Both experiments will be repeated and studied for data to analyze
the reactions. (.5 year to 2 years)
 
3. Theories of UofU and BYU reactions will be confirmed. (1 to 3 years)
 
4. New reactions will be theorized and confirmed.  (1 to 3 years, some
overlapping with #3 as confirmation of theories, and continuing as a
new field of study/engineering)
 
5. Commercial and military applications.  (1 to 20 years: 1 because
the present UofU reaction could already be used even if dangerously
unexplained)
 
6. Commercial production of fuels and equipment for numerous configurations,
from cheap huge stationary units to compact mobile "clean" units. (6
to 20 years)
 
 
Now, if people will stop posting guesses for #3 until they have some
data from #2...
--
Scot E. Wilcoxon  sewilco@DataPg.MN.ORG    {amdahl|hpda}!bungia!datapg!sewilco
Data Progress 	 UNIX masts & rigging  +1 612-825-2607    uunet!datapg!sewilco
	I'm just reversing entropy while waiting for the Big Crunch.
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / John Berryhill /  Re: My theory.  By Ann Elk.  Ahemm Ahemm..
     
Originally-From: berryh@udel.EDU (John Berryhill)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: My theory.  By Ann Elk.  Ahemm Ahemm..
Date: 13 Apr 89 03:15:14 GMT
Organization: University of Delaware

In article <4931@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM> larryh@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM
(Larry Hutchinson) writes:
>
>Net-people of the world arise!  The fate of science as we know it rests in
>our hands.  Our task, should we choose to accept it, is to get to the
>bottom of the P&F experiment.
 
And barring that, at least more people will know how to use FTP than
previously...
 
							       John Berryhill
			    143 King William  Newark, DE 19711 (302) 453-1578
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Joe Buck /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: jbuck@epimass.EPI.COM (Joe Buck)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 21:40:51 GMT
Organization: Entropic Processing, Inc., Cupertino, CA

In article <1578@wasatch.utah.edu> jacobs%cmos.utah.edu@wasatch.utah.edu
(Steven R. Jacobs) writes:
>Er, no.  Photons do *NOT* have mass.  They could not travel
>at the speed of light if they did have mass.  Photons are
>pure energy.  The (E = mc^2) formula is a relationship
>between mass and energy, and it *DOES* represent a conversion
>of mass (not matter) to energy (mass and energy are two forms
>of the same "thing").
 
Photons have zero REST mass (but on the other hand they are never at
rest).  A photon has mass equal to E/c^2, or hv/c^2 where h is
Planck's constant and v is the frequency.  It is really incorrect
(though it's certainly common) to say that mass is converted into
energy; mass IS energy and energy IS mass.  A photon is no more "pure
energy" than any other particle.
 
In exothermic nuclear reactions, the REST masses of the products
add up to less than the REST masses of the reactants; the excess
gets turned into photons together with the kinetic energy of the
particles as they shoot off.
--
-- Joe Buck	jbuck@epimass.epi.com, uunet!epimass.epi.com!jbuck
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Bug Hunter /  Re: My theory.  By Ann Elk.  Ahemm Ahemm..
     
Originally-From: khearn@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Bug Hunter)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: My theory.  By Ann Elk.  Ahemm Ahemm..
Date: 13 Apr 89 05:08:49 GMT
Organization: Cal Poly State University -- San Luis Obispo

In article <4931@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM> larryh@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM
(Larry Hutchinson) writes:
>
>I would also like to see the Texas A&M researchers do multiple runs including
>control experiemnts using light water.  The experiments should be done
>under double (or at least single) blind conditions.  Has anyone heard if
>they have done any control experiments?
 
Huh?? I thought double blind testing was when neither the researcher nor
  the test subject knew if they were in the control or the experiment.
  How does that apply here? do we not tell the electrolytic cell
  whether its got the heavy water or the normal water? I don't see how
  a double blind experiment could be appied here.
 
A single blind test is (i believe) usually when the subject doesn't
  know he he/she/it is a control or an actual test. I assume in this
  case you mean that the tester wouldn't know if he's doing a control
  or the actual test, but I don't see the point. How could that make a
  difference? If the researcher's knowledge of whether or not he has
  heavy or normal water could effect the results, you need to redesign
  your experiment. If both the control and the test are done the exact
  same way, it can't matter who knows what.
 
Blind testing is used for medical testing to prevent placebo effects,
  I don't see how it could be applied to physics. Am I
  misunderstanding the meaning of single and double blind testing?
 
Keith Hearn
 
--
Keith Hearn                   \
khearn@polyslo.calpoly.edu     \  "I drank WHAT???"
Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo       \               -- Socrates
(805) 541-2147 or (805) 756-7180 \
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Thomas Wang /  n + palladium
     
Originally-From: ttwang@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Thomas Wang)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: n + palladium
Date: 13 Apr 89 06:12:04 GMT
Organization: Cal Poly State University -- San Luis Obispo

I am interested in hearing what would happen if a neutron hits a palladium
nucleus.  Would this cause fission to occur?  If the palladium swallows up
the neutron, does this explain the lack of neutron emission?
 
Also if some fusion path ways produce high energy charged particles, would
the lattice better be able to absorb the energy then if the particles were
not charged?
 
 -Thomas Wang ("I am, therefore I am."
                 - Akira               )
 
                                                     ttwang@polyslo.calpoly.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Dennis Thurlow /  Swedish patent
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Swedish patent
Date: 12 Apr 89 17:02:02 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC  S. Plainfield, NJ

>| 	A swedish engineer patended a method for producing helium from
>| 	hydrogen with Palladium back in 1926 (nineteenhundredtwentiesix).
>
>  I got a note from someone else about this, and they said the process
>had never been a commercial success because it generated too much heat.
>Can someone with access to Swedish patent files check this? If true, it
>would be a great joke (if you like irony).
 
Any US Patent library should carry english translations of patents
from countries we have patent agreements with, like Sweden.
The library on the west side of 42nd in NY is one example. If
there is real interest, and no one else is willing, I will try to
get a copy this weekend. I can fax it to anyone who can scan it
for the net.
nsscb!det
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Dennis Thurlow /  A Theory
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: A Theory
Date: 12 Apr 89 18:06:26 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC  S. Plainfield, NJ

>However Georgia Tech aslo did not have reports of excess heat generation.
>This is even more interesting how these two experiments show very
>different results...
 
Now wait a minute. I've been reading all kinds of theories about what
might be going on in the p+f experiemnt, and the a&m and git "confirmations"
but I have yet to see anyone write about what seems to me to be the most
likely possiblity. The story today about the 1224 (or 26) patent producing
too much heat simply confirms it for me.
 
First premiss: Any of the experiments are producing a very crude
reaction that is not optimized, tuned, or understood. If the p+f
experiment is a result of a combination of reactions or fusions,
than other crude experiments might well duplicate only one of
those results.
 
Second premiss: Diffusion into the Pd lattice will not differ
in general from any diffusion process. The lighter stuff will
move into (or up) the medium faster than the heavy stuff.
 
Third premiss: The Pd cathode is NOT homogenous. A cross section
would probably show H at the center (early in the "charge cycle"),
D farther out in a ring around the H saturated region, and Li on
the surface and prehaps slightly diffused. Iron and heavier metals
in the BYU experiment collected on the Pd, but were probably too
heavy to diffuse in (prehaps due only to a lack of energy).
 
Fourth premiss: Whatever is responsible for the effect in the
Swedish patent (2H + ? --> He + heat + ?) does the same thing
at the center of the Pd of the p+f experiment. The resulting heat
coupled with the "ozmotic pressure" on the D causes a series of
DH (briefly) and then DD reactions, making more heat, pressure,
and a jumble of n, photons, gamma, and just about anything else
that people have proposed. This then causes LiH and LiD reactions
to occur, some to Li7 + ?, some to Be8 with subsequent decay,
and so on....
 
Could some of you engineers comment on this theoretical model?
-nsscb!det
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Dennis Thurlow /  Re: Mishaps
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Mishaps
Date: 12 Apr 89 18:47:09 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC  S. Plainfield, NJ

>Two related popular references about such matters are:
>
>   New York Times, May 3, 1987: Peter Lewis, "Risks Are Growing in A-War
>      Systems"
>
>   Parade, October 18, 1981: Jack Anderson, "Are We Safe From Our Own
>      Nuclear Weapons?"
 
And as a general source may I strongly suggest:
 
The Curve of Binding Energy: A Biography of Theodore B. Taylor
by John McPhee (sorry, don't have publisher handy).
-nsscb!det
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Dennis Thurlow /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 18:42:32 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC  S. Plainfield, NJ

>Photons have mass.
 
Are you sure? I'm under the impression that photons only
APPEAR to exhibit some of the properties of mass if viewed
with your mouth held in the correct position. Breathe wrong and,
oops! Now it's a wave.
-nsscb!det
ps-I have a theory to account for this dual identity. -det
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Jim Lai /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: jwtlai@watcgl.waterloo.edu (Jim W Lai)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 04:42:32 GMT
Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario

In article <6743@bsu-cs.bsu.edu> dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Rahul Dhesi) writes:
>It's a common misconception among most college students, fuelled by
>badly-written physics books, that mass and energy are interconvertible.
>
>Not true.  Mass is a property of matter and it is also a property of
>energy.  The conversion of matter to energy preserves mass.  One gram
>of matter, if converted to energy, gives exactly one gram of energy.
 
Relativistic mass is always conserved (this is identical to conservation
of energy), but rest mass isn't.  However, this doesn't change the fact
that a photon has a zero rest mass.  Photons can be assigned a nonzero
relativistic mass based on their energy.
 
At least, that's what the physics text in front of me says. :-)
To illustrate that energy conservation and relativistic mass
conservation were identical, the text uses MeV as the unit of
mass and kinetic energy of a particle.
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Brian Godfrey /  Re: Cure for AIDS?
     
Originally-From: brian@sequent.UUCP (Brian Godfrey)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Re: Cure for AIDS?
Date: 12 Apr 89 23:00:15 GMT
Organization: Sequent Computer Systems, Inc

>>My impression from reading this article is that deuterium is not particularly
>>toxic, but you shouldn't drink it.  I'd be interested in knowing whether the
>>anti-tumor effect has been fully investigated.  Who knows, it might be a
>>treatment for AIDS.
>More likely a cure for run-away mitosis (cancer).
 
   Feed the patient palladium pellets with absorbed deuterium. After it
collects in the tumor, apply voltage. Voila! Cancer is nuked, patient is
cured and reduces his electric bill at the same time. :-)
--
 
--Brian M. Godfrey
  Sequent Computer Systems Inc.
  !tektronix!sequent!brian
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Jon Singer /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 08:44:06 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA

In his second posting, Rahul Dhesi reveals that he is using slightly
different definitions of the terms from those that appear to be common
among the rest of us:
 
 >
 >It's a common misconception among most college students,
 >fuelled by badly-written physics books, that mass and energy
 >are interconvertible.
 >
 >Not true.  Mass is a property of matter and it is also a
 >property of energy.  The conversion of matter to energy
 >preserves mass.  One gram of matter, if converted to energy,
 >gives exactly one gram of energy.
 >
 >Photons can travel at the speed of light not because they
 >have zero mass (not true) but because (hypothetically) if
 >they were *not* travelling at all, they would have a zero
 >mass.  Their actual mass is exactly the mass of their
 >energy, since photons are 100% energy and 0% matter.
 >--
 >Rahul Dhesi <dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu>
 >UUCP:    ...!{iuvax,pur-ee}!bsu-cs!dhesi
 >
 
It appears to me that this is not resolvable without
considerable back-and-forth, which would be a whole lot
easier in person.
 
I, for one, am willing to let it stand as "We agree to have
slightly different definitions of the term `mass' or the
term `rest mass'," if everyone else is. (My definition of
`rest mass' seems to be essentially identical to Rahul's
definition of `matter', at least at first glance.)
 
Cheers!
jon
 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jon Singer is (feel free	|
to fill in the blank any way	|	Trigons! I must have trigons!
you wish to, ok?), and		|	Igor, find a trigon shop for me!
is also jon@Apple.COM		|
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Tim Maroney /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 13 Apr 89 08:13:21 GMT
Organization: Eclectic Software, San Francisco

 
In article <6951@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney) writes:
> [ subnuclear reactions? ]
>This opens a terrifying prospect of a new generation of weapons with
>potential explosive yields in the gigaton range, or even higher...
 
In article <1989Apr11.170517.2780@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry
Spencer) writes:
>No, actually it doesn't.  They aren't particularly *useful*.  It would
>not be difficult to build a hydrogen bomb with gigaton-plus yield;
>there is no fundamental limit on the size of an H-bomb.  Nobody has
>bothered, for the same reason that nobody actually builds 100-megaton
>bombs:  a really big nuclear bomb spends much of its energy "making
>the rubble bounce" near ground zero.
 
I was thinking more in terms of a three-mile-altitude airburst than a
ground blast.  I don't have my references on computing the effects of
atomic explosions any more, but a gigaton burst of this type might be
expected to wipe out an area roughly the size of Rhode Island.  Don't
tell me that's not strategically useful.
 
No one bothers to build bombs this big?  I'd heard that the Sovs had a
few 200-meggers pointed at Cheyenne, but maybe this was a misprint; the
actual figure was probably 20 megatons, not 200.  In any case, like so
much else in military strategy, it's a question of cost efficiency.  If
the cost of building a gigaton warhead drops an order of magnitude or
three, I guarantee the superpowers are going to build some of them.  If
possible, the minor nuclear powers would also be likely to get in on
the act.
 
>Unless one is attacking an
>extremely "hard" target like Cheyenne Mountain, several smaller bombs
>are more effective, because their energy can be spread out.  The biggest
>nuclear weapon in the US arsenal is only nine megatons, and it's
>considered pretty much obsolete.  Modern nuclear weapons are rarely
>over a megaton or so.  The rush to build bigger and bigger bombs ended
>nearly 30 years ago when its futility was recognized.
 
Well, it has a lot to do with the fact that it's so incredibly expensive
to build such big fission-fusion-fission bombs.  A new technology based
around a chain reaction at smaller scales could change all that.
 
>(Actually, its futility was recognized, but not acted on, still earlier:
>the Oppenheimer report, circa 1950, stated that there was no plausible
>military requirement for the hydrogen bomb.)
 
Which is quite probably true; most weapons that can only be used at the
end of the world are useless if you squint the right way.  But for some
reason, we went right ahead and built them, and consider it a crisis now
that we don't have any good source for tritium to keep building and
maintaining them.  The same bigger is better mentality would, I'm sure,
drive the superpowers to make "hadron bombs" if a way were discovered.
Can't risk a neutron gap, ya know.
--
Tim Maroney, Consultant, Eclectic Software, sun!hoptoad!tim
"The Diabolonian position is new to the London playgoer of today, but not to
 lovers of serious literature.  From Prometheus to the Wagnerian Siegfried,
 some enemy of the gods, unterrified champion of those oppressed by them, has
 always towered among the heroes of the loftiest poetry."
    - Shaw, "On Diabolonian Ethics"
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Tim Maroney /  Re: Georgia Institute of Technology Partially Replicates P & F
     
Originally-From: tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Georgia Institute of Technology Partially Replicates P & F
Date: 13 Apr 89 08:28:28 GMT
Organization: Eclectic Software, San Francisco

In article <6962@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney) writes:
>On an unrelated topic, can anyone tell me why the decay of a neutron
>into a proton and electron would require rewriting quantum physics?
 
In article <3069@epimass.EPI.COM> jbuck@epimass.EPI.COM (Joe Buck) writes:
>Yes, neutrons decay into protons and electrons (and a neutrino as
>well, or was that an antineutrino?), with a half-life of around 1000
>seconds (20 minutes or so).
 
I hadn't realized that free neutrons were quite so unstable; since we've
heard three different lifetime estimates in the last few days, I don't
feel too bad about this, though.  I take it that being bound into an
atomic nucleus significantly reduces the rate of decay, since most of
the larger atoms we find lying about have roughly equal numbers of
protons and neutrons.
 
>The reaction is exothermic.  The inverse
>reaction occurs when a star is collapsing into a neutron star
>(electrons combining with protons to form neutrons).
 
Mm-hm, that was why I was so sure that the inverse (fission) reaction
was possible.  I didn't know it was so common, though.
 
>Now if someone suggested we aren't seeing neutrons in F&P because neutron
>decay is accelerated somehow, THAT would require new physics.
 
That's the bit I don't understand and would like to hear an explanation
for, if it's possible to make it clear to such a dim bulb as myself.
If virtual particle interactions in the atomic nucleus slow down the
rate of decay, why couldn't a quantum of real energy speed up the
decay?  Most particles are happy to fly into flinders if you hit them
hard enough; that's one of the basic principles behind high-energy
physics, after all.
 
Bear in mind that I don't expect this to be vindicated in the long run;
I'm just wondering why it's not even on the table at present.  There
seems to be a tremendous difficulty in reconciling the P&F results with
any known fusion process, and that's well travelled territory -- it's
not too bloody likely that something new is going to turn up there.  It
seems natural to start looking at the somewhat less well understood
territory inside the hadron for possible explanations.  And you've got
to admit, if something *was* accelerating neutron decay, that would tie
up both the low neutron flux and the high heat generation in one tidy
little package.
--
Tim Maroney, Consultant, Eclectic Software, sun!hoptoad!tim
"Don't talk to me about disclaimers!  I invented disclaimers!"
    - The Censored Hacker
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudentim cudfnTim cudlnMaroney cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Paul Koloc /  Re: Cold Fusion   ..  possible reactions
     
Originally-From: pmk@prometheus.UUCP (Paul M Koloc)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion   ..  possible reactions
Date: 13 Apr 89 08:51:08 GMT
Organization: Prometheus II, Ltd., College Park, MD 20740-0222

In article <11900@ut-emx.UUCP> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
>In article <1989Apr10.075250.26858@cs.rochester.edu>, dietz@cs.rocheste
.edu (Paul Dietz) writes:
>> My wild guess, then, is that if anything is happening, we're
>> seeing p+d fusion.   .. .  ..  p + d --> 3He
>> ...  . ..             	  p + d + e- --> 3He + e-
 
 
>However, this fails to address the claim by Fleischmann that they detected
>anomalous concentrations of He4 (but *not* He3) when analyzing the gases
>emitted from the experiment.  Maybe this result is an error.  Maybe it's
>just another piece of rumor-mongering.
 
>Having convinced myself .. that Li6+D would make a lot of neutrons I can only
>say that a 3-body reaction seems necessary.  I like the idea of using
>one of the available electrons.  I would still bet on lithium.
>I'm still extremely skeptical that any such process would have a high
>enough cross section.
 
I agree with Pons.
 
A L L   D + D reactions form (superscript 4)He, an alpha, in a very
excited state, whereupon at low density, i. e. plasma fusion, one
of the 4 nuclides gains most of the energy and breaks loose from
the nuclear binding energy leaving behind the other three.  These
reactions toss out either a neutron or a proton and leave behind
a (superscript 3)He or tritium, respectively.  However, like the
difference between jitterbugging on a waxed hard wood floor and
in quick sand, the excited nascent alpha from the d-d reaction in
the metal lattice gives up its energy to the surrounding medium
by a form of viscous damping.  Consequently, only a very, very
few of these excited state He4, nascent alphas, are able to lose
a nuclide fast enough to be in time to avoid damping below the
critical escape energy.  Moreover this paucity of neutrons even
lack the energy of their thermonuclear plasma produced cousins.
 
Therefore:   D + D -->  (superscript 4)He + Energy (lattice heating)
                        ---   mostly  with NO further decay!
Alphas are so stable, normally, they even maintain identity within
heavy nuclei.
 
Thank God for little science and independent chemists!
			
                        Good bye  Tokamak
                          Hello PLASMAK
+-------------------------------------------------------************
| Paul M. Koloc, President: (301) 445-1075              ** FUSION **
| Prometheus II, Ltd.; College Park, MD 20740-0222      *** this ***
| mimsy!prometheus!pmk; pmk@prometheus.UUCP             ** decade **
+-------------------------------------------------------************
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudenpmk cudfnPaul cudlnKoloc cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Paul Dietz /  Re: Cold Fusion
     
Originally-From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 10:03:10 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

In article <5230@cs.Buffalo.EDU> lanthony@sunybcs.UUCP (Lawrence Anthony) writes:
>>[...]  The H- ions are in the octahedral
>>sites.  Band theory calculations support this, and the metal-hydrogen
>>distance in PdH(x), 1.3 angstroms, is the sum of the radii of the H-
>>and the metal in its maximum oxidation state. [...]
 
>Since the lattice constant of Pd is 3.89 A, the distance from the
>octahedral center to the (six) nearest Pd atoms would be half that
>(1.95 A).  The figure of 1.3 A given above would then imply that
>the H atom/ion is not at the exact center of the octahedral interstice
>in the Pd crystal lattice.  Comments?
 
The correct statement: the radii of Pd(+4) and H(-1) are .64 and 1.4
angstroms (CRC handbook); the lattice constant for PdH(x) (x=.67) is a
bit over four angstroms.
 
	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudendietz cudfnPaul cudlnDietz cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Neal McBurnett /  Re: A&M Experiment (was Re: Fusion newgroup proposal)
     
Originally-From: neal@druhi.ATT.COM (Neal D. McBurnett)
Newsgroups: misc.headlines,sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: A&M Experiment (was Re: Fusion newgroup proposal)
Date: 12 Apr 89 14:18:59 GMT
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Denver CO

in article <42629@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu>, martens@calorie.cis.ohio-stat
.edu (Jeff Martens) says:
> Based on everything I've read, the people at Texas A&M did nothing to
> attempt to determine whether their results were due to fusion.
> Someone in alt.fusion said they measured caloric output only and
> didn't bother with radiation shielding; if this is true, we've still
> gotta wait before anyone knows anything.
 
There are 2 issues: can this sort of experimental setup produce cold
fusion, and can it produce net energy output.
 
Cold fusion is nothing new.  Sakarov predicted it in the '40s via muon
catalasis, and it was demonstrated in the '60s.  There is an article in
the July '87 scientific american about muon-catalyzed fusion.
 
As for the new electrochemical stuff, the folks at BYU have recently
submitted a paper on fusion via a similar setup to the F&P setup, and
the BYU findings were duplicated last week (I forget where).  Now folks
in Georgia have confirmed the cold fusion aspects of the F&P paper.
 
 
The real news is that F&P claim to get energy out of the process.  All
of the previous cold fusion experiments put a lot more energy in than
they got out.  Thus the calorimetric confirmation of Texas A&M is, I
think, the most important news of the last 2 weeks.
 
Now we just have to try to figure out the quantum mechanics, figure out
whether it can be scaled up, and figure out whether it will compete
cost-effectively with other energy sources.  As previous posters have
demonstrated, if the energy density of the reaction can't be
dramatically improved (and we don't have much basis for speculation
either way here), then the capital costs of palladium are currently the
biggest problem - the cost of the fuel is negligable.  Not many people
will spend over $150 for a troy oz. of palladium in order to generate
an ever-lasting net output of 54 watts....  Of course, other metals
might work, although F&P say they have tried lots of others.
 
-Neal McBurnett, att!druhi!neal
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / S Henning /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: smh@alux2.ATT.COM (S. Henning)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 12 Apr 89 18:13:42 GMT
Organization: Laboratory 5217

Rahul Dhesi <dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu> wrote:
 
>Photons have mass.
 
>Other than this minor detail, you are correct about the conversion of
>matter (not mass) to energy.
 
 
Definition of photon:
 
A quantum of electromagnetic radiation which has ZERO REST MASS
and an energy of h(Planck's Constant) times the frequency of
the radiation.  Photons are generated in collisions between
nuclei or elctrons and in any other process in which an electrically
charged particle changes its momentum.  Conversely, photons
can be absorbed (annihilated) by any charged particle.
 
Photons have momemtum but not mass.
 
If they had mass, they could never travel at the speed of light,
which, of course, they do by definition.
 
Cheers,
Steve Henning, AT&T Bell Labs, Reading, PA           UUCP: att!alux2!smh
****                    Lang May Your Lum Reek                      ****
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / G Syswerda /  Cold fusion with normal water
     
Originally-From: syswerda@bbn.com (Gilbert Syswerda)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Cold fusion with normal water
Date: 13 Apr 89 12:05:03 GMT

Richard Harris reported on NPR this morning that Stanly Pons stated at an
American Chemical Society meeting yesterday that he has been trying the
cold fusion experiment with normal water during the last several weeks, and
produced a reaction similar to, although not as strong as, that produced
when using heavy water. Virtually no details were given. Harris also
reported that Pons said that the normal water experiments were not very
interesting.
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Paul Dietz /  Re: Cold Fusion
     
Originally-From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 12:09:02 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

Another correction: the miscibility gap in Pd disappears above
a critical temperature of about 320 deg C.
 
	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Paul Dietz /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 12:02:10 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

Photons have mass.  They do not have rest mass.  These are two
entirely different concepts.
 
Thought experiment:  take a box whose inside walls are perfect mirrors.
Place it on a scale.  Fill it with photons.  Photons hitting the top
of the box are gravitationally redshifted w.r.t. photons reflecting
from the bottom ==> they have less momentum ==> radiation pressure
on the bottom is greater.  So, the scale records a greater weight
when the box has photons in it.
 
Equivalently, a given force applied to the box causes it to accelerate
more slowly when the box contains photons.
 
	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.12 / Jack Jansen /  Re: At the Crossroads
     
Originally-From: jack@cwi.nl (Jack Jansen)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: At the Crossroads
Date: 12 Apr 89 20:40:03 GMT
Organization: AMOEBA project, CWI, Amsterdam

In article <28820@apple.Apple.COM> jon@Apple.COM (Jon Singer) writes:
>Mike invokes it as a possible explanation of why Pons and Fleischman
>didn't see neutrons during the first 8 hours of their experiment. I
>think that may be partly reasonable.
>
>But my original question was, really, why don't P&F see anything early
>on, when _the_BYU_people_ONLY_see_stuff_early_on_?
 
Maybe F&P used a new electrode each time, while the BYU people used
the same one as in previous runs, so it was still pre-charged?
Their paper said that they cleaned the electrode, so they must have
been using one (or a few) all the time.
--
--
Een volk dat voor tirannen zwicht	| Oral:     Jack Jansen
zal meer dan lijf en goed verliezen	| Internet: jack@cwi.nl
dan dooft het licht			| Uucp:     mcvax!jack
cudkeys:
cuddy12 cudenjack cudfnJack cudlnJansen cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Emmett Black /  Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
     
Originally-From: blackje@sunspot.steinmetz (Emmett Black)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
Date: 13 Apr 89 12:22:32 GMT
Organization: GE Research; Schenectady, NY  12345

In article <22993@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> greg@math.Berkeley.EDU (Greg) writes:
 
>the duplication of cold fusion experiments.  So far Texas A&M, Georgia
>Tech, Moscow University, and some place in Hungary have announced
> ...
>League over "Aggie" schools, but I find it odd that these four places
 
 
Get your facts together ... of the shools listed, only Texas A&M is
an Aggie school ... GA Tech is a top rate engineering school.
 
--Emmett
	J.E.Black; GE Research/K1-3C26; Schenectady, NY 12345
	blackje@crd.ge.com;   ...!uunet!steinmetz!crd!blackje
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Paul Dietz /  Re: Cold fusion with normal water
     
Originally-From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion with normal water
Date: 13 Apr 89 13:06:50 GMT
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY

In article <38613@bbn.COM> syswerda@bbn.com (Gilbert Syswerda) writes:
 
>Richard Harris reported on NPR this morning that Stanly Pons stated at an
>American Chemical Society meeting yesterday that he has been trying the
>cold fusion experiment with normal water during the last several weeks, and
>produced a reaction similar to, although not as strong as, that produced
>when using heavy water. Virtually no details were given. Harris also
>reported that Pons said that the normal water experiments were not very
>interesting.
 
I can think of several reasons for this:
 
(1) Cold fusion is bogus.  (2) p+d fusion is occuring, so some
reaction would be expected from naturally occuring deuterium.  (3)
Maybe he reused an electrode from an earlier experiment using heavy
water, and did not bake it to drive out trapped deuterium.
 
What does he mean "not very interesting" -- preliminary?  Sloppy?
Inconclusive?
 
	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Dale Cook /  More to Ponder
     
Originally-From: cook@pinocchio.encore.com (Dale "Dale" Cook)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: More to Ponder
Date: 13 Apr 89 12:52:26 GMT
Organization: The Woodville MG Garage and Pub

NPR this morning reported that Pons had run a "control" experiment
substituting ordinary H2O for the deterium and "to his surprise"
found that it also produced heat.  (Of course, I heard this while
half asleep on the way to work, so feel free to correct.  :-)
 
 
	- Dale (N1US)	Encore Computer Corporation, Marlboro, Mass.
INTERNET:	cook@pinocchio.encore.com
UUCP:		{buita || talcott || husc6 || bellcore} !encore!pinocchio!cook
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cuddy13 cudencook cudfnDale cudlnCook cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Jay Maynard /  Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
     
Originally-From: jay@splut.UUCP (Jay "you ignorant splut!" Maynard)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,alt.flame
Subject: Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
Date: 13 Apr 89 12:10:41 GMT
Organization: Confederate Microsystems, League City, TX

In article <22993@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> greg@math.Berkeley.EDU (Greg Kuperberg) writes:
}We have recently witnessed a curious trend in announcements concerning
}the duplication of cold fusion experiments.  So far Texas A&M, Georgia
}Tech, Moscow University, and some place in Hungary have announced
}success.  Now I realize that we shouldn't be too snobbish about either
}Western technical superiority or scholarly superiority of the Ivy
}League over "Aggie" schools, but I find it odd that these four places
}have set up successful experiments more quickly than any of the really
}famous American universities, e.g. Caltech, Princeton, Berkeley,
}and Harvard.  I believe that Texas A&M can prevail over Princeton
}on occasion, but it should be an unlikely event.
 
Why? It apparently hasn't occurred to you that Texas A&M, much as it's
derided as a cow college, has one of the most distinguished faculties in
the country. Why else would a large portion of its student body be from
outside Texas? A&M doesn't have the "Ivy League mentality"; that's a
feature, not a bug.
 
}I think that the real story is that the famous schools have gotten at
}least as far as Texas A&M and Georgia Tech, only they've been keeping
}quiet for longer.  After all, what is the reward for announcing
}success?  Your lab is mobbed with reporters, your phone rings off the
}hook, you get misquoted, and you make awkward appearances on
}television.  Either the Texas A&M people didn't think about the
}consequences enough, or they weren't as careful, or they're more
}desparate for media attention.  Research labs in the Eastern bloc
}don't have this problem since they the governments have their press
}on a leash.
 
Or, just maybe, the "famous schools" are too set in the thinking that
"this can't be real", and haven't managed to get the experiment set up
correctly.  Or maybe they don't have the equipment needed to thoroughly
check out the experiment.  Or maybe they simply haven't succeeded yet.
 
...>fwoosh<...flame ON...
Why are you defending the Ivy League snobs, anyway? Why are you at
Berzerkeley instead of up there in the frozen North? If Princeton's so
much obviously better than the state schools, why then do you attend one
instead of going where it's so OBVIOUSLY better?
Take your Eastern intellectual snobbery to alt.dev.null; we don't need
it here.
Or just stick it up your fusion output.
...>sssthppp<...flame OFF...
 
--
Jay Maynard, EMT-P, K5ZC, PP-ASEL   | Never ascribe to malice that which can
uucp:        uunet!nuchat!   (eieio)| adequately be explained by stupidity.
    hoptoad!academ!uhnix1!splut!jay +----------------------------------------
{killer,bellcore}!texbell!          | "Less great!" "Tastes filling!"
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Michael McClary /  Re: Future Fusion Announcements
     
Originally-From: michael@xanadu.COM (Michael McClary)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Future Fusion Announcements
Date: 13 Apr 89 14:56:07 GMT
Organization: Xanadu Operating Company, Palo Alto, CA

In article <3956@datapg.mn.org> sewilco@DataPg.MN.ORG (Scot E Wilcoxon) writes:
>My guesses on future fusion events:
>
> []
>2. Both experiments will be repeated and studied for data to analyze
>the reactions. (.5 year to 2 years)
>
>3. Theories of UofU and BYU reactions will be confirmed. (1 to 3 years)
>
> []
>5. Commercial and military applications.  (1 to 20 years: 1 because
>the present UofU reaction could already be used even if dangerously
>unexplained)
>
>6. Commercial production of fuels and equipment for numerous configurations,
>from cheap huge stationary units to compact mobile "clean" units. (6
>to 20 years)
>
>Now, if people will stop posting guesses for #3 until they have some
>data from #2...
 
On the more optimistic side...
 
#2 has already been done several times.  Solid numbers should be
available by the time the F&P and BYU papers come out.  (The times
you give would be about right for several iterations of theory/
experiment to better characterize what's going on.)
 
Expect the publications to give priority to fusion papers, or be
replaced by leaks to the nets or a new journal or newsletter just
for fusion physics and chemistry.  (These experiments are so easy
that publication delays measured in weeks are killers.)
 
Engineers don't need theories to build a device.  They only need a
mathematical or tabular description of the effects used and a safe
region for the device's operation.  If they'd waited for theory,
steam engines would have taken additional decades.
 
Commercial production of heavy water, palladium, lithium, and
boiler plumbing have been in progress for decades to centuries.
A plating shop could set up to plate the inside of a pipe with
palladium within a week, and any competent, small, steam
engineering firm could knock out a design for a fusion boiler
in a similar time.  This could go a LOT faster than the
Manhattan Project, which had to invent industrial-scale
isotope separation.  Call it June for construction start.
 
The main reasons for delay beyond that are capital-raising,
bureaucratic inertia, extra engineering, and the chance more
research might obsolete the design before construction is
complete.  F&P, if totally confirmed, is so good and simple
that the only such breakthroughs I can imagine are the
substitution of something cheaper than palladium and a big
increase in power.
 
Most of the physicists in the world are hard at work on the theory.
 
If no "gotchas" are found, expect any delay beyond two years to be
regulatory.
 
Regulators, on the other hand, can be expected to wait for solid
theory (for fear it will turn into an H-bomb if somebody adds a
sprinkle of graphite), then bogus theory (that it will turn into
an H-bomb if somebody adds a sprinkle of eye of newt, no matter
WHAT those eggheads say), pilot plants, polls, "leadership",
formation of a consensus, laws requiring urine tests for the
engineers and construction workers, pork-barrel allocation,
lobbying, environmental impact statements...
 
("So, Mr Pons, you say it will drastically cut nuclear waste disposal
problems, solve the oil crisis, stop the greenhouse effect disaster,
end oil spills, acid rain, and automobile air pollution.  But what
effect will it have on the Snail Darter?")
 
One possibility:  Somebody will get a project operating before the
government gets around to prohibiting it.  Something like the time
after the San Francisco Quake when the residents rebuilt Chinatown
while the city council was debating whether to let them.
 
Cars will take longer.  They may depend on further reduction
of neutron and/or tritium output.  And there's nothing so
inertia-bound as an auto company.  (On the other hand, there's
no reason not to convert an I.C. engine for a fusion-produced
fuel such as hydrogen.)
 
Disclaimer:  I'm playing lower-bound.  But I expect a lot of
people to be shocked at how fast this moves.
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudenmichael cudfnMichael cudlnMcClary cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Tomas Rokicki /  Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
     
Originally-From: rokicki@polya.Stanford.EDU (Tomas G. Rokicki)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
Date: 13 Apr 89 16:15:16 GMT
Organization: Stanford University

blackje@sunspot.steinmetz (Emmett Black) writes:
> >the duplication of cold fusion experiments.  So far Texas A&M, Georgia
> >Tech, Moscow University, and some place in Hungary have announced
> >League over "Aggie" schools, but I find it odd that these four places
> Get your facts together ... of the shools listed, only Texas A&M is
> an Aggie school ... GA Tech is a top rate engineering school.
 
Get your facts together ... Texas A&M is a top rated engineering
school.  Don't try to introduce a dichotomy of `Aggie schools' and
`top rated engineering schools'.
 
Gig 'em, Aggies.
 
-tom (EE '85)
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 /  commgrp@silver /  Quest For Fire / Re: Crossroads
     
Originally-From: commgrp@silver.bacs.indiana.edu
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Quest For Fire / Re: Crossroads
Date: 13 Apr 89 15:38:00 GMT
Organization: Indiana University CSCI, Bloomington

 
 
 
> I was wondering when was day 1 of year 1 AF (Anno Fusio, or Age of
> Fusion).
>--
>Scot E. Wilcoxon  sewilco@DataPg.MN.ORG
 
That's the year zero, but the point is that if cold fusion is for real
(and it's looking better every day), it's worth restarting the calendar.
 
>...Here we stand, at the crossroads. Within the next three weeks,
>possibly even within the next three days, someone will get decent
>measurements of both parts of the Pons and Fleischman results...
>- Jon Singer
 
Remember the movie, _Quest For Fire_, in which a tribe of cave people
in danger of extinction prevail because they get fire?  On the literal
level it's just another dumb cave-man movie, though better done than
most.  Its significance is in that the history of technology is one of
quests for hotter, more controllable fire.  Each, when found, brought
a new age of learning and prosperity (albeit accompanied by more
terrible weapons and social problems, hence myths of the dire
consequences of stealing fire from the gods).  Examples:  Bronze,
iron, steam, electricity, air and space travel.
 
We may get to watch history repeat!  Are we wise enough not to let our
new fire go out?
 
I think I'll visit a video store and watch QFF again this weekend.
 
--
 
Frank Reid     NSS 9086
reid@gold.bacs.indiana.edu
Booga Booga!  Fusion!!
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Peter Desnoyers /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: desnoyer@Apple.COM (Peter Desnoyers)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 13 Apr 89 17:02:20 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA

In article <6978@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney) writes:
>
>>This opens a terrifying prospect of a new generation of weapons with
>>potential explosive yields in the gigaton range, or even higher...
>
>In article <1989Apr11.170517.2780@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry
>Spencer) writes:
>>No, actually it doesn't.  They aren't particularly *useful*.  It would
>>not be difficult to build a hydrogen bomb with gigaton-plus yield;
>>there is no fundamental limit on the size of an H-bomb.  Nobody has
>>bothered, for the same reason that nobody actually builds 100-megaton
>>bombs:  a really big nuclear bomb spends much of its energy "making
>>the rubble bounce" near ground zero.
>
>I was thinking more in terms of a three-mile-altitude airburst than a
>ground blast.  I don't have my references on computing the effects of
>atomic explosions any more, but a gigaton burst of this type might be
>expected to wipe out an area roughly the size of Rhode Island.  Don't
>tell me that's not strategically useful.
>
 
If I remember an article by Kostas Tsipis in Sci. Am. a few years ago
correctly:
 
  - a 1 megaton air burst on a very clear day could create a 10 mile
    radius firestorm.
 
  - the blast area (i.e. the area subject to overpressure of >P for
    some P) is proportional to yield^2/3 - i.e. the fireball _volume_
    is proportional to the yield. Thus the radius is proportional to
    (yield)^1/3.
 
  - thus the radius of destruction of a 1 gigaton bomb would be about
    100 miles. (!!!) However, the same area could be destroyed by 100
    1 megaton bombs, requiring 1/10th as many missiles. (assuming
    weight is proportional to yield, which is probably reasonable for
    large bombs of the similar technologies.)
 
(I know I'm comparing radius of blast damage to radius of firestorm.
They are proportional with a factor near 1, and I'm only quoting the
figures which I think I remember correctly.)
 
				Peter Desnoyers
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Peter Beckman /  Washington Post 4/13
     
Originally-From: beckman@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu (Peter Beckman)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Washington Post 4/13
Date: 13 Apr 89 17:09:05 GMT
Organization: Indiana University, Bloomington

Interesting Points:
 
"...MIT and UC@Berkeley also announced they have developed new
theories of how fusion happens that, if accepted, would eliminate the
apparent contradiction with the existing theory. MIT officials said
the university has applied for patents on several technologies based
on its theory, but refused to disclose details."
 
"...Fleishmann said their little table top experiment could easily be
scaled up to the size of power plants."
 
[Hmmm. Maybe it will all end up being resolved in courts, with
disputes over patents.  TX A&M may have duplicated the results, but
with a chalk board and a good patent laywer, MIT might control them.]
 
-Pete
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Jon Webb /  Re: Swedish patent
     
Originally-From: webb@ius2.cs.cmu.edu (Jon Webb)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Swedish patent
Date: 13 Apr 89 16:49:28 GMT
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI

In article <739@nsscb.UUCP>, det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow) writes:
> >| 	A swedish engineer patended a method for producing helium from
> >| 	hydrogen with Palladium back in 1926 (nineteenhundredtwentiesix).
> >
> >  I got a note from someone else about this, and they said the process
> >had never been a commercial success because it generated too much heat.
> >Can someone with access to Swedish patent files check this? If true, it
> >would be a great joke (if you like irony).
 
I don't know if this is the origin of the rumor, but Chemical
Abstracts gives a few references to papers by Fritz Paneth on the
synthesis of He from H in 1927.  He tried using palladium (!) and
electron discharge tubes and looked for helium.  Initially his results
were positive, but he later eliminated some sources of helium
contamination and eventually completely retracted the earlier work.
 
I think that if a Swede did patent a working method for production of
He from H in 1926 (a logical time, by the way -- it seems that there
were several groups trying this) his work would not have been ignored.
Apparently such research was not considered as outlandish then as it
would have been before March 24 of this year, so that many reputable
people would have been interested.  But in any case, Chemical
Abstracts would carry a summary of the patent, and it's not there.
 
By the way, all you fusion skeptics: could you shut up for a while?  I
think it's pretty clear that there is cold fusion going on.  If you're
right, you can have a big laugh at the rest of us, in a month or two.
If not, you're wasting a lot of bandwidth.
 
If you are going to post, please at least read the Fleischmann-Pons
paper and think of an explanation that takes into account what they
observed, including gamma ray production and the observed relation
between the heat produced and the volume (not the surface area) of the
palladium electrode.
 
-- J
 
--
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Emmett Black /  ASCII versions of Cold Fusion papers
     
Originally-From: blackje@sunspot.steinmetz (Emmett Black)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: ASCII versions of Cold Fusion papers
Date: 13 Apr 89 16:55:53 GMT
Organization: GE Research; Schenectady, NY  12345

Picked off sci.space - in case you didn't see it.
 
In article <kYF_bvy00UkZ87EF1L@andrew.cmu.edu> ota+@ANDREW.CMU.EDU (Ted Anderson) writes:
>I have ascii version of both the Fleischmann&Pons (UofU) paper and the
>Jones&Palmer (BYU) paper available.  If you would like to see one or both mailed
>to you let me know.  Send a note to space-request@andrew.cmu.edu specifying
>which you'd like and I'll get them out ASAP.
>
>While this is not entirely space related I thought there would be enough
>interest for warrant a message.
>        Ted Anderson
 
 
--Emmett
	J.E.Black; GE Research/K1-3C26; Schenectady, NY 12345
	blackje@crd.ge.com;   ...!uunet!steinmetz!crd!blackje
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Emmett Black /  Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
     
Originally-From: blackje@sunspot.steinmetz (Emmett Black)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
Date: 13 Apr 89 17:07:55 GMT
Organization: GE Research; Schenectady, NY  12345

Thank you, Jay <jay@splut> for defending Texas A&M;
it's time to say something similar about GA Tech:
 
Ga. Tech was rated in the 1987 US News and World Report poll
of college deans as #11 in the nation in graduate engineering
schools and #4 in the nation as to quality sources of students
for the engineering graduate schools.
 
I believe that it also leads the nation in industrial support for its programs.
 
There is no place for the kind of derision we witnessed here.
 
--Emmett
	J.E.Black; GE Research/K1-3C26; Schenectady, NY 12345
	blackje@crd.ge.com;   ...!uunet!steinmetz!crd!blackje
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Ethan Vishniac /  Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
Date: 13 Apr 89 14:36:41 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <13597@steinmetz.ge.com>, blackje@sunspot.steinmetz (Emmett Black) writes:
> In article <22993@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> greg@math.Berkeley.EDU (Greg) writes:
>
> >the duplication of cold fusion experiments.  So far Texas A&M, Georgia
> >Tech, Moscow University, and some place in Hungary have announced
> > ...
> >League over "Aggie" schools, but I find it odd that these four places
>
>
> Get your facts together ... of the shools listed, only Texas A&M is
> an Aggie school ... GA Tech is a top rate engineering school.
 
It is indeed.  In fact, it is a better engineering school than any Ivy
League university.  Princeton, for example, is doubtless busy trying
to reproduce cold fusion by using psychics instead of palladium.
( sort of half a :-)).
 
Cheer up though.  If even the aggies can do it I don't doubt that UC
will be close behind.
 
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Ed Nather /  ambiguities in negative evidence
     
Originally-From: nather@ut-emx.UUCP (Ed Nather)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: ambiguities in negative evidence
Date: 13 Apr 89 14:46:49 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

Our language, bless it, seems to have a built-in ambiguity which has
become painfully evident in the discussion about experiments in cold
fusion.  Examples:
 
   "The A&M confirmation experimenters didn't find any neutrons"
 
   "The Georgia Tech experimenters did not report any excess heat"
 
and so on.  What do these things mean?  Two possible interpretations:
 
   1. They tried to find [x] but failed to do so.
   2. They didn't try to find [x], so failure to find it means nothing.
 
In the wan hope of avoiding this kind of confusion in the future, might I
suggest we say either
 
   "The experimenters report a significant absence of neutrons ..."
 
or
 
   "Neutron detection (or whatever) was not attempted ..."
 
corresponding to conditions (1) and (2) above.
 
Cold fusion isn't the only place where we encounter this ambiguity.  When
we seek, say, coherent oscillations in a white dwarf star (to pick a
random example) and find none, we should report a "significant absence"
of the sought behavior, rather than the ambiguous "...coherent oscillations
were not detected ..." and, if we're serious about it, also report the
detection limit -- leaving open the possibility they might be there
below the stated limit, but undetected in this measurement.  Example: we
sought optical flashes from the Vela supernova remnant shortly after they
were discovered in the Crab pulsar.  We found none, and reported what we
felt was our limit of detectability.  They were later found, but far below
the limit we were able to set -- vindication! (Sort of)
 
My mother always told me not to try to reform the world, but I never listened
to her ...
 
--
Ed Nather
Astronomy Dept, U of Texas @ Austin
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Jim Horne /  Re: Cold fusion with normal water
     
Originally-From: jhh@pupthy.PRINCETON.EDU (Jim Horne)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion with normal water
Date: 13 Apr 89 17:31:46 GMT
Organization: Physics Dept, Princeton Univ

In article <38613@bbn.COM> syswerda@bbn.com (Gilbert Syswerda) writes:
>Richard Harris reported on NPR this morning that Stanly Pons stated at an
>American Chemical Society meeting yesterday that he has been trying the
>cold fusion experiment with normal water during the last several weeks, and
>produced a reaction similar to, although not as strong as, that produced
>when using heavy water. Virtually no details were given. Harris also
>reported that Pons said that the normal water experiments were not very
>interesting.
 
If the NPR report is true, then I would say that Fleischmann and Pons
have just made big fools of themselves. Performing their experiment
with normal water instead of heavy water is the obvious control
experiment.  That would be the easiest way to figure out whether they
were being fooled by a strange chemical reaction or not. I was quite
disturbed that they did not mention any such control experiment in
their paper. Perhaps they had tried it, and got the same results as
with heavy water, but decided that would rule out any fusion taking
place, so they didn't mention it. I don't think anyone could stomach
hydrogen fusion. If NPR is right, then all they have is a chemical
reaction, and someplace they didn't add their energy input properly.
There might still be fusion at the much lower rate given by the neutron
flux, but the calorimetric measurements would be complete garbage.
 
Sell your palladium futures today!
 
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
Jim Horne                              A quote? I'm supposed to have a quote?
jhh@pupthy.Princeton.EDU
 
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 /  Greg /  My previous comments about fusion experiments.
     
Originally-From: greg@jif.berkeley.edu (Greg)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: My previous comments about fusion experiments.
Date: 13 Apr 89 19:08:42 GMT
Organization: U.C. Berkeley

It appears that my previous comments concerning the duplication
of fusion experiments were either overstated or misinterpreted
or both.  Oh well.  I'm getting to regret posting to the net more
and more as each year goes by.  But there's no turning back now,
so I will attempt to clarify my last posting.
 
I realize that Georgia Tech is not an Aggie school, and I'm sure
that lots of fine research comes out of Texas A&M.  I'm sorry if
I offended anyone for dumping on their alma mater.
 
But at the same time, do we really have to pretend that all schools
are equal?  Or do we have to go further than that and declare
that the only reason that any university is considered better than
any other school is intellectual snobbery?  Should we therefore
conclude that any school with a good reputation must be a bad school
because snobbery is rampant there?
 
I realize that there is a lot of snobbery at a lot of universities,
but that's not the only reason that, for example, Cal Tech has a
better reputation in physics than Georgia Tech.  I'm not suggesting
that Californians are a superior species to Georgians (if anything,
the reverse is true :-)).  One reason it has a better reputation
is that it had Richard Feynman, and a one reason for that is that it
had a better reputation 30 years ago.  And all that may change 30
years from now.
 
But for whatever reason (and I hope I've thrown in enough qualifiers to
placate at least some of you out there), there are more Nobel laureates
and more breakthroughs in chemistry and physics at MIT, Berkeley, and
Harvard than there are at Texas A&M and Georgia Tech.  So doesn't it
surprise any of you that both of the last two and none of the first
three schools have announced success in duplicating Pons and
Fleischmann's work?  How many of you are willing to declare:  "I've
always thought that Texas A&M has better chemistry research than MIT,
and their work on cold fusion is one illustration.  If I were offered
the same faculty position at both schools I would pick Texas A&M."
 
I'm not going to continue with my speculations about why Texas A&M and
Georgia Tech have gotten more press over cold fusion than MIT (and for
that matter Los Alamos and Livermore).  I find it strange.  If other
people think this is perfectly natural, I would like to hear an
informed opinion on why exactly it is no surprise.
---
Greg
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Thomas Spencer /  Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
     
Originally-From: spencert@cs.rpi.edu (Thomas Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
Date: 13 Apr 89 18:54:53 GMT
Organization: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY

>In article <524@megatek.UUCP> mark@megatek.UUCP () writes:
>>So who wants to speculate on which big industrial concern will be the first
>>to sell a commercial, ready to operate, fusion reactor to your friendly
>>local electrical company? GE? General Atomic? Westinghouse? Somebody in
>>France or Japan? Someone we have never heard of yet?
>
I think that the first comercial use of this technology will not be to
feed power into the electrical grid.  There will be some specialized
application that uses it first.  I have no idea what this application
will be.
 
 
 
			-Tom Spencer
			 spencert@turing.cs.rpi.edu
			 uunet!steinmetz!turing!spencert
"First figure out what you are trying to do."  -Me.
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Mike Peltier /  Re: the original papers
     
Originally-From: stealth@caen.engin.umich.edu (Mike Peltier)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: the original papers
Date: 13 Apr 89 16:48:00 GMT
Organization: Computer Aided Engineering Network, University of Michigan

In article <528@eutrc3.UUCP> rcbaem@eutrc3.UUCP (Ernst Mulder) writes:
>Can someone send me the orirgnal files directly? The PostScript
>versions please. Our FTP program has no connection to
>sam.cs.cmu.edu, so I can't get them myself.
 
Think twice before you request these -- make sure you have disk space. :-)
I could hardly beleive when I found out that each 3 meg PS file was one page.
It took nearly ten minutes to print on a LaserWriter +.  I would suggest
that someone with a Mac translate the document to a Mac wordprocessor,
with all the fonts, symbols, etc, and translate *that* to PostScript.
I should think that the file would be *much* smaller and much easier to read
and to print.
 
	-Mike Peltier	
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Paul Chisholm /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: psrc@pegasus.ATT.COM (Paul S. R. Chisholm)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 16:22:31 GMT
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories

<"Would you like me to summon Data so he could offer a few dozen synonyms?">
 
In article <9196@watcgl.waterloo.edu>, cslewis@lily.waterloo.edu (Cary Lewis)
writes that Canada has all the Right Stuff to be fusion pioneers, but
 
> it will be probably be years before any of this happens, and as
> was mentioned we have lots of pressing environmental problems that we
> must (i.e. have to) solve, before any of this clean power comes on line.
 
Yes, like getting the Americans to stop burning coal and use something
cleaner to generate electricity with.
 
Worse things could happen than Canada selling lots of electricity to
the U.S., both for profit, and to save Canadian lakes, streams, etc.
 
Paul S. R. Chisholm, AT&T Bell Laboratories
att!pegasus!psrc, psrc@pegasus.att.com, AT&T Mail !psrchisholm
I'm not speaking for the company, I'm just speaking my mind.
No, I'm not a Canadian citizen, but I play one on the network.
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Marc deGroot /  Re: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
     
Originally-From: marc@mas.UUCP (Marc deGroot)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
Date: 13 Apr 89 20:08:00 GMT
Organization: Measurex Automation Systems, Cupertino CA

In article <17008@cup.portal.com>, mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson) writes:
> [ Stuff about a green blinking light deleted ]
> I was hoping the
> Aggie results would be the first non-Mormon, non-Communist verification
> of the Utah results, but this flashing light makes me wonder.
>
> Georgia Tech also confirmed the results today, in terms of neutrons.
> Those people seem more normal.
 
When your questioning of scientific work is based on where a person lives,
what kind of a deity they pray to, or what economic system they prefer,
you entirely destroy your own credibility.
 
-Marc de Groot
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Vince Heuring /  Re: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
     
Originally-From: heuring@boulder.Colorado.EDU (Vince Heuring)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Texas A&M Results:  What's Wrong With This Picture
Date: 13 Apr 89 15:24:07 GMT
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder

In article <1265@ns.network.com> logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan) writes:
>Daniel Hinojosa writes:
>> My impression was that the emitted light was from the experiment itself.
>
>After watching the report several times on CNN, it appeared to me that the
>flashing was from some external apparatus.  I could see the palladium rod,
>of the dimensions mentioned by F+P, suspended in the liquid.  The flashing
 
The light, albeit impressive, was from a light bulb immersed in the
constant temperature water bath.  It was being used as a heat source.
 
 
 
----
 Vincent Heuring     Dep't of Electrical & Computer Engineering
 University of Colorado - Boulder        heuring@boulder.Colorado.EDU
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / John Logajan /  Re: Neutron decay
     
Originally-From: logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Neutron decay
Date: 13 Apr 89 16:17:30 GMT
Organization: Network Systems Corp. Mpls MN

> What is the rest mass of the electron, the proton and the
> neutron?  If the rest mass of the neutron is less that e+p, then it must
> require energy input for neutron decay.  If the rest mass of n is
> greater than e+p then neutron decay must liberate energy.
 
Okay, the rest mass of a neutron has 2.5 electron rest masses additional
mass than a proton -- so the neutron can easily split and liberate energy.
 
Now, tritium has only about 1/10 of an electron mass extra over He3, yet
tritium beta decays into He3.  Where does the mass-energy come from to allow
this to happen??????
 
--
- John M. Logajan @ Network Systems; 7600 Boone Ave; Brooklyn Park, MN 55428  -
- ...rutgers!umn-cs!ns!logajan / logajan@ns.network.com / john@logajan.mn.org -
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / J Goldader /  UW Students detect signs suggesting cold fusion
     
Originally-From: jeffg@blake.acs.washington.edu (Jeffrey D. Goldader)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: UW Students detect signs suggesting cold fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 19:18:47 GMT
Organization: Univ of Washington, Seattle

Two physics grad students here at the University of Washington have
detected signs of tritium possibly produced by a cold fusion reaction.
 
 
In a press conference here today, students Van Eden and Wei Liu said
they used a mass spectrometer and saw the signature of the deuterium-
tritium molecule (mass=5).
 
 
Their apparatus consisted of a hollow palladium electrode sealed at
one end connected to an ultra-high vacuum mass spectrometer.  Gold wire
was used as the anode.  The electrodes were placed in D2O and run at
10V and 1 milliamp for 3.5 hours before the DT molecule was detected.
They let it run for 10 hours, and the DT signal continued.
 
As a control, they ran the same setup with H2O, and found no tritium
signal within detectable limits.
 
They returned to D2O, and the signal reappeared after waiting a while
(the exact waiting time was not specified).
 
They originally started by trying to replicate the Fleischman/Pons
experiment.  After a long wait running the apparatus with varying
voltages, nothing happened, and they got bored (voltage ranged from
10V to 700V)  They decided to try what they were good at, namely
ultra-high vacuum.  They then put together the setup described above.
 
The tritium signal was observed at ~100 times the background level.  The
setup looked at the gases which diffused through the outside of the
tube into the hollow, evacuated inside.  They didn't want to bother
with dissociating the DT molecule.
 
 
No neutrons were detected, although the detector used was not very
sensitive.
 
The production rate of tritium was very low.  Van Eden said it would
have taken them ~10000 years to make one paperclip's mass worth of T.
 
They plan to repeat their experiment with better detectors after getting
some sleep.  A paper has been submitted to Physical Review Letters.
 
 
The above was taken from the notes I took at the press conference and
from the handouts.  There may be errors.
 
The students were quick to point out that mass spectroscopy is a
very inexact science, and that they couldn't be 100% certain of
their results, but they were confident enough to publish.  They
stated that this is **not** certain confirmation of cold fusion, just
very interesting experimental results.  More study and different
experiments will be needed to confirm the existence of cold fusion.
 
A group from Chemistry will be trying to replicate the F&P experiment
next week.
 
 
 
Jeff Goldader
jeffg@uw-beaver!blake
 
The above article is mine alone, and does not represent the opinions of
the University of Washington.
 
"For rent: one large slightly used space station.  Inquire IKI, Moscow."
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Henry Spencer /  Re: Reactions to Fusion
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Reactions to Fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 17:57:28 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <2362@van-bc.UUCP> sl@van-bc.UUCP (pri=-10 Stuart Lynne) writes:
>}Nah, we'll take that drab green stuff of yours, in adequate quantities of
>}course.  Special just for you, palladium at only $1000/ounce.
>
>Henry, you missed the sales meeting. $1000/ounce is the price for
>members of the Commonwealth. The US or Nato price is $1100/ounce.
 
Have they set the limit for palladium sales to OPEC countries yet? :-)
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Henry Spencer /  Re: Commentary on Usefullness of Networks
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Commentary on Usefullness of Networks
Date: 13 Apr 89 17:59:05 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <734@nsscb.UUCP> det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow) writes:
>There is safety in a multitude of council.
>
>I'll take the 10,000 answers, thank you.
 
Go not to Usenet for counsel, for it will say no and yes and no and yes and...
 
(apologies to JRR Tolkien)
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Chris Phoenix /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: cphoenix@csli.STANFORD.EDU (Chris Phoenix)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 21:26:49 GMT
Organization: Center for the Study of Language and Information, Stanford U.

This turned up a random thought:  If a photon at rest has no mass (or however
you want to state it), what does a photon a rest "look like"?  Would it just
disappear?
The article mentions "gravitational redshift" of photons.  Now: What happens
if you have a very heavy object and you send a beam of photons straight up?
At some point, they will stop.  Will they stick around and start to fall back
as photons, gaining energy on the way?
Sorry if this is a stupid question--please, no flames.
 
--
Chris Phoenix              | "I was afraid of worms!  Worms, Roxanne!"
cphoenix@csli.Stanford.EDU | "More input!  More input!"
Usenet:  The real source of the "Tastes Great" vs. "Less Filling" debate.
Disclaimer:  Don't mind me, I'm just a student!
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudencphoenix cudfnChris cudlnPhoenix cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Robert Henry /  UWash Observes Tritium Production in FP Cell
     
Originally-From: rrh@june.cs.washington.edu (Robert R. Henry)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.chem,alt.fusion
Subject: UWash Observes Tritium Production in FP Cell
Date: 13 Apr 89 18:22:29 GMT
Organization: U of Washington, Computer Science, Seattle

I attended a press conference at 0930PDT Apr 13, 1989 on the University
of Washington Campus.  What follows is my retyping of the press
release.  My brief comments are in square brackets.  I am a computer
scientist, and not involved with any of this work.
 
April 13 1989
 
UW students detect signs suggesting 'cold fusion'
 
An experiment conducted by two graduate students in physics at the
University of Washington may be producing indications of a fusion
reaction at room temperature..
 
The experiment, conducted by Van L. Eden and Wei Liu, involves the use
of a test tube containing "heavy water" (D20) in which a palladium
electrode and a gold wire [they didn't have any platinum] are placed.
The electrode and wire are connected to a power source [~10v, ~1ma].
The palladium electrode, which is actually a hollow rod with one end
sealed, is connected to an ultra high vacuum chamber which serves as
part of a detection system.
 
After about 3.5 hours, a [quadrupole] mass spectrometer connected to
the vacuum chamber began to detect a mass component [mass 5] that is a
possible indicator of tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen that
is commonly produced in fusion reactions.  Their apparatus continued to
detect this mass for 10 hours.
 
As a control, they shut down the apparatus, filled their test tube with
ordinary water and ran the experiment again.  The signal that was
suspected to be tritium dropped to below measurable levels, and was not
detected again.
 
Finally, Eden and Liu ran the experiment a third time with heavywater
and observed the return of the signal, showing that if indeed the
signal is from tritium, they have found a way to start and stop the
fusion process.
 
Eden and Liu began their work after scientists at the Univ. of Utah
announced their experiments suggesting fusion could occur at room
temperature.  "We happened to have some heavy water in the laboratory,
and I was able to get some palladium pretty easily," Eden said.  They
worked steadily for about a week before obtaining their results.
 
Normally, scientists expect a fusion reaction to produce substantial
quantities of neutrons, but Eden and Liu have not detected a ny,
although they are not using a particularly sensitive detector.
 
Eden and Liu cautioned that while their results are suggestive of a
fusion reaction, they are by no means conclusive, since they have not
ruled out other explanations for their observations.
 
Eden and Liu have not yet measured the energy output of their apparatus
[hard to do in the mass spectrometer set up they are using], but Eden
estimates, assuming the observed signal is tritium, that approximately
as much fusion energy was released as electrical energy was added to
the system.
 
These findings have been submitted to Physical Review Letters.  Other
researchers looking into the room temperature fusion claims have
reported mixed success in finding indications of a fusion reaction.
Eden and Liu's observation of the possible fusion reaction byproduct,
Eden said, may be due to the novel palladium electrode geometry and the
detection system they used.
 
Eden and Liu are graduate students studying surface science--the way
atoms and molecules stick surfaces and move around.  Both came to the
UW in 1986-- Eden from England, and Liu from the People's Republic of
China.
 
[Eden did most of the talking.  4 TV stations in attendance, plus 10 or
so other kinds of reporters.  Eden handled the leading questions very
well, and was quite pointed about the press making a premature
sensation about the fusion work.  Eden repeatedly gave very cogent
discussions on how science works, and how confusion and
cross-fertilization are important to the process.  Lets hope some of
the meta lesson on the scientific process makes it into the media.]
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudenrrh cudfnRobert cudlnHenry cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Steve Smith /  Re: Deja Vu
     
Originally-From: smith@cos.com (Steve Smith)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Deja Vu
Date: 13 Apr 89 21:43:29 GMT
Organization: Corporation for Open Systems, McLean, VA

In article <22565@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> bks@alfa.berkeley.edu (Brad Sherman) writes:
|Didn't the "Skylark" series of novels by (Chemist) "Doc" E.E. Smith,
|go sort of like this: Scientist puts wire in chemical bath, applies
|current, wire flies through wall, interstellar travel?
|
|	--Brad Sherman
 
 
Perhaps closer than you might think.  It depended on a funny nuclear
physics experiment going on next door ....
 
--
                -- Steve
(smith@cos.com)    ({uunet sundc decuac hqda-ai hadron}!cos!smith)
"Truth is stranger than fiction because fiction has to make sense."
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cuddy13 cudensmith cudfnSteve cudlnSmith cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Mike Coffin /  Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
     
Originally-From: mike@arizona.edu (Mike Coffin)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
Date: 13 Apr 89 21:09:54 GMT
Organization: U of Arizona CS Dept, Tucson

From article <1267@rpi.edu>, by spencert@cs.rpi.edu (Thomas Spencer):
> I think that the first comercial use of this technology will not be to
> feed power into the electrical grid.  There will be some specialized
> application that uses it first.  I have no idea what this application
> will be.
Will REI will finally replace the venerable Svea 123?
 
--
Mike Coffin				mike@arizona.edu
Univ. of Ariz. Dept. of Comp. Sci.	{allegra,cmcl2}!arizona!mike
Tucson, AZ  85721			(602)621-2858
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Troy Barbee /  Re: Neutron decay
     
Originally-From: twbag@garnet.berkeley.edu (Troy Barbee)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Neutron decay
Date: 13 Apr 89 22:17:16 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley

In article <1269@ns.network.com> logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan) writes:
>Now, tritium has only about 1/10 of an electron mass extra over He3, yet
>tritium beta decays into He3.  Where does the mass-energy come from to allow
>this to happen??????
 
It happens because tritium decays to He3+, not He3. Thus the additional
18KeV appears as kinetic energy of either the electron or the
antineutrino.
 
Troy Barbee
UC Berkeley Dept. of Physics
twbag@garnet.berkeley.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / David Mellinger /  Re: ambiguities in negative evidence
     
Originally-From: davem@polya.Stanford.EDU (David K. Mellinger)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: ambiguities in negative evidence
Date: 13 Apr 89 22:21:46 GMT
Organization: Stanford University

> Our language, bless it, seems to have a built-in ambiguity which has
> become painfully evident in the discussion about experiments in cold
> fusion.
> ....
 
 
Or as MIT astronomer Walter Lewin says,
 
	"Absence of evidence should never be
	 mistaken for evidence of absence."
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 /  fusion@zorch.U /  Submission for Alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: fusion@zorch.UU.NET
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Submission for Alt.fusion
Date: 13 Apr 89 21:11:31 GMT
Organization: Alt.fusion/Mail Gateway

Marcos Montes at Stanford (marcos@fizzle.stanford.edu) came up with this
thought virtually simultaneously.  It's probably not that unusual an idea,
but I haven't seen in mentioned in alt.fusion yet.
 
If it turns out that energy-gain-cold-fusion phenomenon is limited strictly
to occurring within a Palladium (or even Pt group) lattice, there may be
enough of a supply/demand mismatch to _finally_ make space a commercially
viable resource.  There are bound to be significant quantities of palladium
and other platinum group metals in some of those asteroids, and this might
make them valuable enough to go up and down the dreaded potential well to
get them.
 
Welcome to ceres, sir!  Please display your Exxon visitor's badge
in a prominent location.
 
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudenfusion cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 /  commgrp@silver /  Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion re
     
Originally-From: commgrp@silver.bacs.indiana.edu
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion re
Date: 13 Apr 89 22:43:00 GMT
Organization: Indiana University CSCI, Bloomington

 
 
 
>We have recently witnessed a curious trend in announcements
>concerning the duplication of cold fusion experiments...
 
>I think that the real story is that the famous schools have
>gotten at least as far as Texas A&M and Georgia Tech, only
>they've been keeping quiet for longer.  After all, what is the
>reward for announcing success?  Your lab is mobbed with
>reporters, your phone rings off the hook, you get misquoted, and
>you make awkward appearances on television...
 
The early bird gets the re$earch grant!  I can't help thinking
that some bad science may be going down amid the rush to announce
replication of the F&P experiment.  One group reports excess heat
but neglected to look for neutrons; another claims neutrons but
didn't bother with calorimetry.
 
--
 
Frank
reid@gold.bacs.indiana.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Dave Mack /  Re: Cold fusion with normal water
     
Originally-From: mack@inco.UUCP (Dave Mack)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion with normal water
Date: 13 Apr 89 22:03:06 GMT
Organization: McDonnell Douglas-INCO, McLean, VA

In article <7715@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> jhh@pupthy.PRINCETON.EDU (Jim Horne) writes:
>In article <38613@bbn.COM> syswerda@bbn.com (Gilbert Syswerda) writes:
>>Richard Harris reported on NPR this morning that Stanly Pons stated at an
>>American Chemical Society meeting yesterday that he has been trying the
>>cold fusion experiment with normal water during the last several weeks, and
>>produced a reaction similar to, although not as strong as, that produced
>>when using heavy water. Virtually no details were given. Harris also
>>reported that Pons said that the normal water experiments were not very
>>interesting.
>
>If the NPR report is true, then I would say that Fleischmann and Pons
>have just made big fools of themselves. Performing their experiment
>with normal water instead of heavy water is the obvious control
>experiment.  That would be the easiest way to figure out whether they
>were being fooled by a strange chemical reaction or not. I was quite
>disturbed that they did not mention any such control experiment in
>their paper. Perhaps they had tried it, and got the same results as
>with heavy water, but decided that would rule out any fusion taking
>place, so they didn't mention it. I don't think anyone could stomach
>hydrogen fusion.
 
Ahem. Tap water contains ~ .015% deuterium. D + H --> He-3 + ??? MeV.
 
How *much* heat were they getting out?
 
Second, how do you know H + H + e --> D + ??? MeV isn't likely inside
a palladium lattice?
 
This is a whole new ball game. Let's not be too quick to jump to
conclusions. It might be chemical, it might be nuclear. We'll probably
have a definite answer within a few months. But if it's chemical,
I'd really like to know where those neutrons that F&P, Jones et al,
and the GIT group measured were coming from.
 
And if it *is* H + H... You wanna talk about cheap energy?
 
--
Dave Mack
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / John Logajan /  Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
     
Originally-From: logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: A curious pattern of cold fusion replication.
Date: 13 Apr 89 21:14:47 GMT
Organization: Network Systems Corp. Mpls MN

greg@oreo.berkeley.edu (Greg) writes:
> I believe that Texas A&M can prevail over Princeton
> on occasion, but it should be an unlikely event.
 
Gosh, based on this theory F+P didn't really discover the effect first.
It was probably really discovered at MIT -- which explains MIT's
announced negative results last week -- they didn't want to tip their
hand too early and give away their lead :)
 
--
- John M. Logajan @ Network Systems; 7600 Boone Ave; Brooklyn Park, MN 55428  -
- ...rutgers!umn-cs!ns!logajan / logajan@ns.network.com / john@logajan.mn.org -
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / John Logajan /  Re: My theory.  By Ann Elk.  Ahemm Ahemm..
     
Originally-From: logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: My theory.  By Ann Elk.  Ahemm Ahemm..
Date: 13 Apr 89 21:10:03 GMT
Organization: Network Systems Corp. Mpls MN

Larry Hutchinson writes:
> (1) errors are being made in the calorimetery or (2) ...
 
I think chemists have been doing calorimetery for over two hundred years --
they have probably worked out most of the first order effects :)
 
Recall that the discrepencies (at at least two independent labs) are on
the order of 100 to 800 percent -- not some fraction of a percent, as you
would expect in slightly off calibration.
 
More likely, if the effect is eventually chemical, the discrepancy arises in
that energy is being released from some as yet unknown storage in the
palladium/deuterium mix.
 
--
- John M. Logajan @ Network Systems; 7600 Boone Ave; Brooklyn Park, MN 55428  -
- ...rutgers!umn-cs!ns!logajan / logajan@ns.network.com / john@logajan.mn.org -
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudenlogajan cudfnJohn cudlnLogajan cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Joe Buck /  Re: Cold Fusion   ..  possible reactions
     
Originally-From: jbuck@epimass.EPI.COM (Joe Buck)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion   ..  possible reactions
Date: 13 Apr 89 23:09:22 GMT
Organization: Entropic Processing, Inc., Cupertino, CA

In article <1118@prometheus.UUCP> pmk@promethe.UUCP (Paul M Koloc) writes:
>A L L   D + D reactions form (superscript 4)He, an alpha, in a very
>excited state, whereupon at low density, i. e. plasma fusion, one
>of the 4 nuclides gains most of the energy and breaks loose from
>the nuclear binding energy leaving behind the other three.  These
>reactions toss out either a neutron or a proton and leave behind
>a (superscript 3)He or tritium, respectively.
 
OK.  I'm clear about this part.
 
>  However, like the
>difference between jitterbugging on a waxed hard wood floor and
>in quick sand, the excited nascent alpha from the d-d reaction in
>the metal lattice gives up its energy to the surrounding medium
>by a form of viscous damping.
 
If the lattice gains energy, this might show up as lattice vibrations.
Since particles are waves and vice versa in the wonderful world of
quanta, this is equivalent to saying that the energy is given off as a
phonon (yes, lattice vibrations can be treated as particles bouncing
around -- I always thought this was cool).  But what does a phonon
with a MeV of energy look like?  This seems way above the energy that
any vibration level could have.
 
>  Consequently, only a very, very
>few of these excited state He4, nascent alphas, are able to lose
>a nuclide fast enough to be in time to avoid damping below the
>critical escape energy.  Moreover this paucity of neutrons even
>lack the energy of their thermonuclear plasma produced cousins.
 
But the excited He4 can't lose energy continuously.  It has to lose
it as quanta.  It can't damp out gradually.  If there are intermediate
excited states of He4, it can lose energy in several steps.
--
-- Joe Buck	jbuck@epimass.epi.com, uunet!epimass.epi.com!jbuck
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Gary Dare /  fusion generated materials: GOLD?
     
Originally-From: gld@CUNIXD.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU (Gary L Dare)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics,sci.chem
Subject: fusion generated materials: GOLD?
Date: 13 Apr 89 23:59:37 GMT
Organization: Columbia University, Dept. EE & CTR

Date: 13 Apr 89 14:01:00 EDT
Originally-From: "FORMAN, RICHARD" <forman@ecf.icst.nbs.gov>
Subject: more stuff for the bulletin board
 
Reference with lost provenance.  Approx 1978-1980 in New York Times.
 
Article: There's gold in them thar stills by Clyde H. Farnsworth.
 
Reports: According to the tale a Russian physicist emigrated recently
to Israel and reported that before he left the Soviet Union, two
former school-mates working at a nuclear research laboratory near
Siberia's Lake Baikal [probably near Irkutsk-I think] had happened
upon a way to make gold, and more importantly to make it at a cost of
less than $600 an ounce.  Experts in the US said: William Klemperer,
then at NSF,: You're talking about a cost of anywhere between $1000
and $1,000,000 a gram.
 
Edwin Goldwasser: U of Illinois: My intuition tells me that even with
a fusion machine, the quantities of material available would not make
it a profitable venture.....
 
Forman says: why if that was all true they could probably find a way
to make fissionable material also and then they could close down those
damn dangerous nuclear reactors.  Hmmmm?!
 
(please follow-up to Richard Forman)
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudengld cudfnGary cudlnDare cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Gary Dare /  Neutrino fluxes from fusion
     
Originally-From: gld@CUNIXD.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU (Gary L Dare)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics,sci.chem
Subject: Neutrino fluxes from fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 00:01:38 GMT
Organization: Columbia University

Date: 13 Apr 89 14:03:00 EDT
Originally-From: "FORMAN, RICHARD" <forman@ecf.icst.nbs.gov>
From forman@ecf.icst.nbs.gov Thu Apr 13 14:15:41 1989
 
The solar neutrino flux is wrong.  Two options learn all about
neutrino physics to find artifact in neutrino experiments OR try some
reactions different than those that Bethe says are the right ones for
the fusion on the sun.  Soviet authors for those papers are Kopysov
and Fetisov.  They seem to have stopped publishing lately (since about
1980 that is.).  Hmmmm??!
 
(all replies to Richard Forman, please)
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Gary Dare /  Hazard Warning re: fusion
     
Originally-From: gld@CUNIXD.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU (Gary L Dare)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Hazard Warning re: fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 00:03:41 GMT
Organization: Columbia University, Dept. EE & CTR

Date: 11 Apr 89 17:54:00 EDT
Originally-From: "FORMAN, RICHARD" <forman@ecf.icst.nbs.gov>
 
Scientists in the Soviet Union who have been working on resonant
nuclear reactions for many years have had several serious accidents
based on analysis of open literature papers.  Anyone attempting
experiments in this area should assume for safety's sake that the
entire sample could react and then size and shield sample accordingly.
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Mark Brader /  Re: deuterium harmful?
     
Originally-From: msb@sq.com (Mark Brader)
Newsgroups: sci.chem,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: deuterium harmful?
Date: 13 Apr 89 19:58:28 GMT
Organization: SoftQuad Inc., Toronto

Tim McDaniel debunks my signature:
> >Mark Brader, SoftQuad Inc., Toronto, utzoo!sq!msb, msb@sq.com
> >		"Everything that can be invented has been invented."
> >		-- Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. patent office, 1899
 
citing the reference:
> See "A Patently False Patent Myth", by Samuel Sass, in "The Skeptical
> Inquirer", Vol. 13, No. 3, Spring 1989, p. 310-312.  Excerpts follow.
 
My thanks to him and to Steve Bellovin who emailed me a reference to
the same article.  I've deleted the quote from my signature collection.
 
 
--
Mark Brader	"No flying machine will ever fly from New York to Paris ...
utzoo!sq!msb	 [because] no known motor can run at the requisite speed for
msb@sq.com	 four days without stopping ..."  -- Orville Wright (c. 1908)
 
This article is in the public domain.
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Gary Dare /  A clue to background on cold fusion
     
Originally-From: gld@CUNIXD.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU (Gary L Dare)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics,sci.chem
Subject: A clue to background on cold fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 00:06:27 GMT
Organization: Columbia University, Dept. EE & CTR

(this article posted on behalf of Richard Forman at NIST)
 
Originally-From: "FORMAN, RICHARD" <forman@ecf.icst.nbs.gov>
 
The complete understanding requires knowledge of both Hund's rule and
his isomer theory.  Professor Doktor Hund is alive, and I hope well at
90 years of age, and living in his old college town.  Unfortunately
almost all of his seminal work is forgotten because it has never been
translated from the German.  I also note that in spite of his early
pioneering work on atomic spectra, the work which underlies all of
magnetism and crystal field theory, molecular spectroscopy, etc. this
grand old man of BOTH physics AND chemistry has not YET been honored
with a free trip to Stockholm.
 
Key paper is Friedrich Hund 1927 vol?? p.805ff in section on "The
Paradox of the Optical Isomers" where he discusses resonant tunnelling
in WKB approx.
 
Work of E. Segre and Daudel in 1947 on effect of outer electrons on
k-capture which shows that electronic state has effect on nucleus.
See also article by Stan Block in Physics Today vol29 September 1976.
 
Core polarization effects called s-d interaction in Knight shift work;
strange magn. susceptibility measured by Candela--reported in J. Chem.
Phys. vol 48, 5187 (1968)
 
Electric field effects on bands in solids called Franz-Keldysh effect;
see Shaklee, Cardona, Pollak -Electroreflectance at a semiconductor
electrolyte interface Phys Rev 1965; Forman Aspnes Cardona J Phys Chem
Solids 1970.
 
A detailed addendum covering the theory of the recent experimental
breakthroughs is being added to my unpublished and unsubmitted
manuscript on the theory of catalysis of nuclear reactions.  Copy will
be sent to all persons who send self addressed envelope to me.  Must
first get agency clearance for release---that takes a few weeks.
 
Dr. Richard A. Forman, Physicist
National Institute of Standards and Technology  (new name for NBS)
National Computer Systems Laboratory
Advanced Systems Division
A61 Technology Building
Gaithersburg, MD 20899
 
If I am unable to obtain a release from NIST to send out preprints
promised above I plan to submit the manuscript to Science, the journal
I prefer as a medium of refereed but rapid publication.
 
I hate netmail.  I reply to ALL letters, but don't want to reply to
numerous netmail questions.  I'll try but letters are better.
 
Since I feel that Professor Doktor Hund is the greatest living
chemical physicist I have often wondered why he has not been
appropriately honored for his great work.  After years of study and
some small amount of correspondance with him my conclusion is that he
was not a member of the right club.  Some things depend more on who
you know and who your friends are than what you know or do.
 
I hope that someone who has the ability to rectify the enormous slight
to Professor Doktor Hund will do so as I think this is the right time
of year to make appropriate nominations.
 
(Please send all follow-ups to Richard at above address)
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Gary Dare /  Fusion: Physicist's view, Chemist's view
     
Originally-From: gld@CUNIXD.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU (Gary L Dare)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics,sci.chem
Subject: Fusion: Physicist's view, Chemist's view
Date: 14 Apr 89 00:08:37 GMT
Organization: Columbia University, Dept. EE  & CTR

(Another article from Richard Forman at NIST.  I had to reassemble
this from various single-screen messages, as he seems to be having
editor problems on his VAX.  All replies to Richard, please.)
 
Originally-From: "FORMAN, RICHARD" <forman@ecf.icst.nbs.gov>
 
Subject: Physicist Think
 
Let us examine the analogy between crystal field spectra of electrons and
some-kind-of-field spectra of nuclei.   Consider the system of a titanium
nucleus and two deuterium nuclei at rest and bound together somehow.  The
Wigner-Eckhart (sp?) theorem says there will be a splitting of the levels
and we now have the set of levels appropriate for the left side of the
chemical fusion equation.
 
On the right side of the chemical fusion equation we have the titanium
nucleus and a helium nucleus.  Since the titanium appears equally on
both sides of the equation we call it a catalyst.  If, and probably
only if, the experimental results show helium it is then worth going
through all of the reactive intermediate states to try to identify the
actual levels involved in the resonant tunnelling.
 
All the titanium isotopes must be considered and have to use nuclear
shell model to get levels of compound nuclei appropriate for
intermediates.  Example: titanium plus deuteron goes to excited
vanadium; excited vanadium might decay to scandium emitting alpha or
it might decay to other excited vanadium or it might decay to ground
state vanadium and then....  Not yet worth the effort of cataloging
until more expt. data from chemists.  Most important data to
get:Microchemical isotopic analysis of electrodes.  Contact me for the
name and phone number of the world class expert who can get this job
done.  Only those with samples ready to go should contact me.
Government scientists have limited resources; contracts from other
govt.  agencies are very hard to get.
 
Subject: Chemical Physicist think
 
The metal somehow broadens the energy levels of the system because the
fields decaying into the metal are inhomogeneous.  The broadened
levels overlapbetter and the tunnelling probability goes up.  When the
field is shut off a polarization builds up on the surface which just
doesn't do the match of levels as well.
 
Subject: Chemist think
 
THINK CHEMISTRY: The first chemical physicist, J. Willard Gibbs taught
us that a system not in equilibrium will tend toward equilibrium.  The
system of two deuterons in a box is unstable against fusion to form
helium; it just takes forever to get there.  Consider a container with
2 moles of hydrogen gas and one mole of oxygen gas.  By analogy to
ongoing fusion work the way to get the reaction going is to heat the
system up and to increase the pressure so that the molecules slam
against each other hard enough for the electronic clouds to
interpenetrate.  Chemists who really don't worry as much as physicists
about electrons and other things that they can't see or touch would
probably try a flame, a spark, some platinum catalyst, or maybe even
some beta-alumina as a fuel cell to get the INEVITABLE reaction to
occur.
 
Then they would babble about non-physics concepts such as bonding and
anti-bonding orbitals, excimers, reactive intermediates of unknown
composition.  As Professor Doctor Hund has written in his RECENT
papers (in English) the great tragedy of modern science is the schism
between physics and chemistry.  Linus Pauling has discussed this issue
also.  Chemists get things done.  There is a poster which says
something like : Thunder is great but it is the lightning which really
does things.
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ je me souviens ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 Gary L. Dare				> gld@eevlsi.ee.columbia.EDU
					> gld@cunixd.cc.columbia.EDU 	
  Edmonton: The City of Champions	> gld@cunixc.BITNET
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudengld cudfnGary cudlnDare cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Brett Glass /  Re: Swedish patent
     
Originally-From: glass@anableps.berkeley.edu (Brett Glass)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Swedish patent
Date: 14 Apr 89 00:02:25 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley

In article <4706@pt.cs.cmu.edu> webb@ius2.cs.cmu.edu (Jon Webb) writes:
 
>By the way, all you fusion skeptics: could you shut up for a while?  I
>think it's pretty clear that there is cold fusion going on.  If you're
>right, you can have a big laugh at the rest of us, in a month or two.
>If not, you're wasting a lot of bandwidth.
 
They have as much right to be skeptical -- and to talk about it -- as
you have to believe it's "pretty clear that there is cold fusion going
on." If you're looking to avoid divergent opinions, you shouldn't read
netnews.
 
<BG>
============================================================================
"One of the nicest things about mathematics, or anything else you might
 care to learn, is that many of the things which can never be, often are."
                                      Norton Juster, "The Phantom Tollbooth"
============================================================================
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 /  andrew /  cancel <10485@nsc.nsc.com>
     
Originally-From: andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,misc.headlines
Subject: cancel <10485@nsc.nsc.com>
Date: 13 Apr 89 01:00:00 GMT
Organization: National Semiconductor

cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 /  andrew /  cancel <10453@nsc.nsc.com>
     
Originally-From: andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: cancel <10453@nsc.nsc.com>
Date: 13 Apr 89 01:00:00 GMT
Organization: National Semiconductor

cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudenandrew cudlnandrew cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 /  andrew /  cancel <10377@nsc.nsc.com>
     
Originally-From: andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.space,alt.fusion
Subject: cancel <10377@nsc.nsc.com>
Date: 13 Apr 89 01:00:00 GMT
Organization: National Semiconductor

cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudenandrew cudlnandrew cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 /  andrew /  cancel <10346@nsc.nsc.com>
     
Originally-From: andrew@nsc.nsc.com (andrew)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,sci.space,alt.fusion
Subject: cancel <10346@nsc.nsc.com>
Date: 13 Apr 89 01:00:00 GMT
Organization: National Semiconductor

cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudenandrew cudlnandrew cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Ethan Vishniac /  Re: My previous comments about fusion experiments.
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: My previous comments about fusion experiments.
Date: 13 Apr 89 21:20:54 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <23041@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>, greg@jif.berkeley.edu (Greg) writes:
>
> But for whatever reason (and I hope I've thrown in enough qualifiers to
> placate at least some of you out there), there are more Nobel laureates
> and more breakthroughs in chemistry and physics at MIT, Berkeley, and
> Harvard than there are at Texas A&M and Georgia Tech.  So doesn't it
> surprise any of you that both of the last two and none of the first
> three schools have announced success in duplicating Pons and
> Fleischmann's work?  How many of you are willing to declare:  "I've
> always thought that Texas A&M has better chemistry research than MIT,
> and their work on cold fusion is one illustration.  If I were offered
> the same faculty position at both schools I would pick Texas A&M."
 
I'm sure many people have thoughts on this, but here are mine :-).
 
First of all, there are few, *if any*, places that can afford to be
the best in everything.  Most universities build on their strengths
and choose faculty with an eye toward which areas of research appear
the most promising.  In physics this may mean hiring lots of
particles physicists and not many solid state physicists.  "Promising"
here means sexy rather than useful.  Therefore topnotch people can
be found outside of the most famous universities pursuing lines of
research that others have judged dull.  A lot of second rate people
can also be found at these institutions, (and some even at the most
famous schools).
 
Second, the universities mentioned here *are* actually among the best
in the United States.  They are not as famous as the schools you
mentioned, and in some areas they are not as good, but they do have
their strengths.
 
Third, the people who will pursue a wild rumor like this are not
necessarily the most famous and the most accomplished.  They are the
hungriest.  This is an attribute which may be more plentiful at schools
like A&M and Georgia Tech than CalTech.
 
Am I surprised that this experiment has been confirmed at Georgia Tech
and Texas A&M before (for example) CalTech?  Not particularly.  Just
ask yourself where most of the high temperature superconductivity
work has been done in this country.  Was it Princeton?  No?
What was that you said?  University of Houston?  University of
Alabama?  Who ever heard of them?
 
Although Berkeley, CalTech, or MIT have justified reputations for
solid contributions to science and technology they are not as far
ahead of some other universities as you imply.  Moreover, if I were
an engineer (I'm not, but my wife is) and I were offered the choice
of a job at *any* Ivy League school and Georgia Tech (or A&M) I think
I would have to be nuts (or determined to move to a particular area) to
take the Ivy League job.
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
cudkeys:
cuddy13 cudenethan cudfnEthan cudlnVishniac cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Tim Maroney /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 14 Apr 89 00:27:29 GMT
Organization: Eclectic Software, San Francisco

In article <28901@apple.Apple.COM> desnoyer@Apple.COM (Peter Desnoyers) writes:
>If I remember an article by Kostas Tsipis in Sci. Am. a few years ago
>correctly:
>
>  - a 1 megaton air burst on a very clear day could create a 10 mile
>    radius firestorm.
>
>  - the blast area (i.e. the area subject to overpressure of >P for
>    some P) is proportional to yield^2/3 - i.e. the fireball _volume_
>    is proportional to the yield. Thus the radius is proportional to
>    (yield)^1/3.
>
>  - thus the radius of destruction of a 1 gigaton bomb would be about
>    100 miles. (!!!) However, the same area could be destroyed by 100
>    1 megaton bombs, requiring 1/10th as many missiles. (assuming
>    weight is proportional to yield, which is probably reasonable for
>    large bombs of the similar technologies.)
 
Uh, 1/10 as many missiles?  Don't you mean 1/10 the explosive yield,
but 100 times as many missiles?  Delivery systems aren't cheap, you
know.  Nor has their reliability under real wartime conditions been
tested (thank Goddess!).  If 100 missiles are fired, some unknown
number will go astray, possibly even knocking out some of the others.
If two one-gigaton weapons are fired at the same target, the chances of
one delivering the full payload is high.
 
As for the weight proportionality assumption, that's reasonable among
similar technologies, but a hypothetical "hadron bomb" might very well
weigh less per unit yield than a conventional nuclear bomb.  If so, we
still have a more cost effective means of mass destruction.
 
Finally, remember that circles don't tile a plane.  Sure, either a
one-gigaton bomb or 100 one-megaton bombs will cover a total of 31,415
square miles, but there's going to be significant overlap among the 100
blasts if you want complete coverage.  The estimate you've given is
optimistic (what an inappropriate word in this context), neglecting
both reliability and overlap.
--
Tim Maroney, Consultant, Eclectic Software, sun!hoptoad!tim
"Superhero stories could best be described as entertainment that externalizes
 childhood power fantasies." -- Timothy Fay on rec.arts.comics
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudentim cudfnTim cudlnMaroney cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Daniel Hinojosa /  Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
     
Originally-From: hinojosa@hp-sdd.hp.com (Daniel Hinojosa)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Rampant speculation and betting pool
Date: 13 Apr 89 14:22:45 GMT
Organization: HP, San Diego Division

In article <Apr.12.09.28.14.1989.4354@paul.rutgers.edu> masticol@paul.ru
gers.edu (Steve Masticola) writes:
>> So who wants to speculate on which big industrial concern will be the first
>> [...]
 
>Who is first is irrelevant; if fusion can become a major energy
>source, international patent agreements are wastepaper. It's simply
>too valuable and apparently not difficult to reproduce.
>- Steve.
 
Wastepaper? Maybe so. On the front page of the L.A. Times this morning,
the bold header of the article on the Soviets success duplicating
the experiment, reads; "MIT Seeks Patent on Disputed Process". I'd
guess we're headed for the courts. Althogh the fellow from MIT is
seeking the patent because he feels he has an explanation for what is
actually hapening here, reaction wise.
 
 
 
--
=dan=hinojosa=========================================================
email -  uunet!ucsd!hp-sdd!hinojosa \ / uunet!hplabs!hp-sdd!hinojosa
 ---------------------------  ---==(*o*)==---  -----------------------
Jesus saves... but Gretzky gets the rebound! He shoots. HE SCOOORES!!!
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Robert Brooks /  Re: D+D -> He4
     
Originally-From: rb@hpcuhb.HP.COM (Robert Brooks)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: D+D -> He4
Date: 13 Apr 89 00:27:43 GMT
Organization: Hewlett Packard, Cupertino

 
> The Steve Maurer contribution to sci.physics, article 6306, proposes
> (from an unnamed physicist) the reaction D+D -> He4 for a fusion reaction
> without neutron emission. It couldn't happen in free space without
> violating conservation of momentum, since you have to give out a lot of
> energy with zero net momentum.
>
> Ben Green
 
Could someone lucidly explain this "conservation of momentum" business?
Why is it necessarily the case that the resultant He4 nucleus cannot
have a net change in velocity after the fusion event?
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.11 / Joe Collins /  todays ny times
     
Originally-From: joec@Morgan.COM (Joe Collins)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: todays ny times
Date: 11 Apr 89 13:30:03 GMT
Organization: Morgan Stanley & Co. NY, NY

 
Todays NY Times (page 1) says Texas A&M and Georgia Tech have
confirmed 'fusion in a jar'. Per the Times, Dr. Mahaffey
of Georgia Tech says there is no way to get neutrons unless
something nuclear is going on, in reference to his
confirming experiment. He also says the apparatus
cost about $25000. Buy the paper (if available in your area)
and read the details.
cudkeys:
cuddy11 cudenjoec cudfnJoe cudlnCollins cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / bass randale /  Re: Cold fusion with normal water
     
Originally-From: crb7q@hudson.acc.virginia.edu (bass cameron randale)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion with normal water
Date: 13 Apr 89 22:23:49 GMT
Organization: University of Virginia, Charlottesville

In article <7715@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> jhh@pupthy.PRINCETON.EDU (Jim Horne) writes:
>
>If the NPR report is true, then I would say that Fleischmann and Pons
>have just made big fools of themselves. Performing their experiment
>with normal water instead of heavy water is the obvious control
>experiment.  That would be the easiest way to figure out whether they
>were being fooled by a strange chemical reaction or not. I was quite
>disturbed that they did not mention any such control experiment in
>their paper. Perhaps they had tried it, and got the same results as
>with heavy water, but decided that would rule out any fusion taking
>place, so they didn't mention it. I don't think anyone could stomach
>hydrogen fusion. If NPR is right, then all they have is a chemical
>reaction, and someplace they didn't add their energy input properly.
>There might still be fusion at the much lower rate given by the neutron
>flux, but the calorimetric measurements would be complete garbage.
 
Not true.  Keep in mind that the reaction mechanism is as yet unknown.
He may be talking about getting neutron fluxes from a Pd-H (-?%D)
system rather than high additional heat.  In this case he could be getting
some H-D reaction with the small number of D atoms in ordinary water.
It seems to me that only if nearly the same rate of heat
production is found in the H2O control as in the D2O + .5% H2O
experiments, would there be cause for alarm.  Pons also said that the
experiment was "uninteresting", that should tell us that he does not
believe that any significant chemical reactions are causing this.
 
 
                                          dale bass
 
      crb7q@virginia.edu         or             crb7q@hudson.acc.virginia.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / William Johnson /  Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion
     
Originally-From: mwj@beta.lanl.gov (William Johnson)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 03:06:07 GMT
Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory

In article <1569@blake.acs.washington.edu>, jeffg@blake.acs.washington.e
u (Jeffrey D. Goldader) writes:
> Two physics grad students here at the University of Washington have
> detected signs of tritium possibly produced by a cold fusion reaction.
 
Jeff, the following is in no way an attack on you, the two students or the
University of Washington ... but a pattern is appearing here that disturbs me.
 
First, a word about this experiment.  Commercially-available heavy water tends
to be contaminated, to a small degree, with tritium, and electrolysis of heavy
water could therefore be reasonably expected to produce DT in small quantities
without any fusion at all occurring.  (In fact, there are some reasons
pertaining to electrochemistry why DT might be overrepresented in the gas
produced in the electrolysis.)  Because the degree of tritium contamination in
"normal" water is extremely, extremely small, the control experiment would
not be expected to produce the mass-5 stuff.  In short, I find the experiment
flawed, unless the researchers have a VERY good demonstration that the amount
of tritium they detected was greater than expected.
 
Now the disturbing pattern is the following: there appears to be a strong
ANTIcorrelation between the willingness of a given institution to announce
positive results in confirming F&P, and the "professionalism" with which that
institution can attack the problem, based on their available resources and
known expertise in both electrochemistry and nuclear physics.
 
Consider, please, the list of eminent laboratories that have NOT confirmed
F&P.  Los Alamos, Oak Ridge, Argonne, Livermore, Berkeley, Harvard, MIT,
Stanford, Brookhaven (they have retracted their claim of confirmation, I
believe), Bell Labs, CERN ... the list goes on and on.  These institutions
have more in common than good reputations: they also have cadres of
"professional" physicists who can bring a LOT of years' expertise to bear
on the experiments, coupled with (I don't approve of this, but it's true)
considerably more potent experimental apparatus than even most major
universities have.  So why is it that we are now seeing articles that
start "In a press conference today, grad students at the University of X
reported [possible] experimental confirmation of cold fusion", and no such
announcement from these other places?
 
Again, I am certainly not attacking the U of W; its reputation in the physical
sciences is very good, possibly the best of the places that have thus far
announced a confirmation, although (IMHO) not on a par with the ones I list
above.  (The announcement Jeff cites is also the most conservatively worded one
that I have seen.)  But I still wonder why some of the real scientific Big Guns
aren't getting the same kind or results, or at least generating the same
kind of press, as are random groups of graduate students.
 
Flames to /dev/null, please -- unless somebody *can* name a Big Gun that is
claiming a F&P confirmation, and standing on it.
--
"One thing they don't tell you about doing	| Bill Johnson
experimental physics is that sometimes you	| Los Alamos Nat'l Laboratory
must work under adverse conditions ... like	| {!cmcl2!lanl!mwj}
a state of sheer terror." (W. K. Hartmann)	| (mwj@lanl.gov)
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Matthew Kennel /  Re: My previous comments about fusion experiments.
     
Originally-From: mbkennel@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Matthew B. Kennel)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: My previous comments about fusion experiments.
Date: 14 Apr 89 04:21:40 GMT
Organization: Princeton University, NJ

In article <11996@ut-emx.UUCP> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
 
}Am I surprised that this experiment has been confirmed at Georgia Tech
}and Texas A&M before (for example) CalTech?  Not particularly.  Just
}ask yourself where most of the high temperature superconductivity
}work has been done in this country.  Was it Princeton?  No?
}What was that you said?  University of Houston?  University of
}Alabama?  Who ever heard of them?
 
I have to stand up for my department; PU does have a very active
_theoretical_ program in high T_c superconductors (Basically Anderson & his
groupies) but as you state, the high-powered experimental work comes from
other labs.
 
}
}Although Berkeley, CalTech, or MIT have justified reputations for
}solid contributions to science and technology they are not as far
}ahead of some other universities as you imply.  Moreover, if I were
}an engineer (I'm not, but my wife is) and I were offered the choice
}of a job at *any* Ivy League school and Georgia Tech (or A&M) I think
}I would have to be nuts (or determined to move to a particular area) to
}take the Ivy League job.
 
Does this mean, that for Astrophysics (presumably your subject) you'd
be more likely to work in the Ivies?  By Ivy League, do you include MIT?
You can't say that they're weak in engineering...
 
} I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 
 
matt kennel
mbkennel@phoenix.princeton.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Matthew Kennel /  Re: Cold Fusion   ..  possible reactions
     
Originally-From: mbkennel@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Matthew B. Kennel)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion   ..  possible reactions
Date: 14 Apr 89 04:37:17 GMT
Organization: Princeton University, NJ

In article <3078@epimass.EPI.COM> jbuck@epimass.EPI.COM (Joe Buck) writes:
>
>OK.  I'm clear about this part.
>
>>  However, like the
>>difference between jitterbugging on a waxed hard wood floor and
>>in quick sand, the excited nascent alpha from the d-d reaction in
>>the metal lattice gives up its energy to the surrounding medium
>>by a form of viscous damping.
>
>If the lattice gains energy, this might show up as lattice vibrations.
>Since particles are waves and vice versa in the wonderful world of
>quanta, this is equivalent to saying that the energy is given off as a
>phonon (yes, lattice vibrations can be treated as particles bouncing
>around -- I always thought this was cool).  But what does a phonon
>with a MeV of energy look like?  This seems way above the energy that
>any vibration level could have.
 
Yes, this does seem fishy.  But has anybody considered another possibility:
Can the reaction product deposits its energy into the conduction electrons?
The alpha is charged so it could conceivably couple to the electrons
electromagnetically...maybe there is some collective electromagnetic effect?
 
The 4He is in a nuclear excited state?  Are the nucleons in a higher angular
momentum state?  I would venture that it would be unlikely to lose its
energy by some nuclear coupling (very short range) but possibly there is
some electromagnetic coupling.
 
>But the excited He4 can't lose energy continuously.  It has to lose
>it as quanta.  It can't damp out gradually.  If there are intermediate
>excited states of He4, it can lose energy in several steps.
 
But aren't those discrete states really only an approximation valid when the
nucleus doesn't couple to the outside world?  For example, the "free space"
atomic energy levels can broaden and merge when in a metal lattice.
 
However, there seems to be a big hole in these explanations:  nuclear
physicists have long measured the properties of nuclei in fixed metallic
lattices, and as far as I know, haven't had to deal with the atomic lattice!
(except for Moessbauer effects; but here the energies involved are tiny
compared to MeV's; just what you'd expect for phonons.).
 
>--
>-- Joe Buck	jbuck@epimass.epi.com, uunet!epimass.epi.com!jbuck
 
 
matt kennel
mbkennel@phoenix.princeton.edu
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Andrew Plotkin /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: ap1i+@andrew.cmu.edu (Andrew C. Plotkin)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 03:41:23 GMT
Organization: Class of '92, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA

/ This turned up a random thought:  If a photon at rest has no mass (or however
/ you want to state it), what does a photon a rest "look like"?  Would it just
 
/ disappear?
 
According to the laws that predict all this (relativity et al), a photon cannot
be stopped, so the question is meaningless. (*Never* try to discuss philosophy
with a law of physics. :-)
 
/ The article mentions "gravitational redshift" of photons.  Now: What happens
 
/ if you have a very heavy object and you send a beam of photons straight up?
/ At some point, they will stop.  Will they stick around and start to fall back
/ as photons, gaining energy on the way?
 
You have neatly described a black hole. (And they won't get as far as the event
horizon, so you can't actually watch this happen.) For any lesser object, the
photons are moving at greater than escape velocity and will not fall back.
 
/ Sorry if this is a stupid question--please, no flames.
 
Actually, I'm not sure if the photons fall back or just silently vanish. (or
some less visualizable event.) As I said, there's no way to go look.
 
Strike that -- there's no way to go, look, and report back. :-)
 
--Z
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Eric Hughes /  Conservation of momentum (Was: D+D -> He4)
     
Originally-From: hughes@math.Berkeley.EDU (Eric Hughes)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Conservation of momentum (Was: D+D -> He4)
Date: 14 Apr 89 06:14:37 GMT
Organization: UCB Mathematics Department

In article <20420002@hpcuhb.HP.COM>, rb@hpcuhb (Robert Brooks) writes:
 
>> ... the reaction D+D -> He4 for a fusion reaction
>> without neutron emission. It couldn't happen in free space without
>> violating conservation of momentum, since you have to give out a lot of
>> energy with zero net momentum.
 
>Could someone lucidly explain this "conservation of momentum" business?
>Why is it necessarily the case that the resultant He4 nucleus cannot
>have a net change in velocity after the fusion event?
 
I'll make no claims to lucidity.  If you consider the reaction D+D -> 4He
in the center of mass reference frame, the two deuterium nuclei are
headed right for each other.  The net momentum in this reference frame
is zero, thus the endproduct must have zero momentum, i.e. the 4He
is not moving.  This means that that the 4He would have no kinetic
energy.  This situation violates conservation of energy, since the total
energy of the reactants, which is two deuterium rest masses plus their
kinetic energy, is greater than a helium rest mass.
 
Certain alterations fix that problem.  If the 4He is in an excited nuclear
state, the total energy of the reactants is now the helium rest mass
plus the energy difference between the excited state and the ground state,
which could conceivably balance the energies.
 
Another way is to have more than one product.  If other particle comes
out of the reaction in addition to the 4He, the two particles can
split the momentum between the two of them, and both carry off kinetic
energy.  That is why the reaction D+D+D -> 4He+D can balance energetically,
while D+D -> 4He cannot.
 
Eric Hughes
hughes@math.berkeley.edu   ucbvax!math!hughes
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Tim Maroney /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 05:15:08 GMT
Organization: Eclectic Software, San Francisco

In article <8521@csli.STANFORD.EDU> cphoenix@csli.stanford.edu (Chris Phoenix)
writes:
>This turned up a random thought:  If a photon at rest has no mass (or however
>you want to state it), what does a photon a rest "look like"?  Would it just
>disappear?
>The article mentions "gravitational redshift" of photons.  Now: What happens
>if you have a very heavy object and you send a beam of photons straight up?
>At some point, they will stop.  Will they stick around and start to fall back
>as photons, gaining energy on the way?
>Sorry if this is a stupid question--please, no flames.
 
No, they're not stupid questions.  Modern physics answers them by using
a very counter-intuitive principle realized by Einstein.  The speed of
light is the same regardless of your frame of reference.  If you fly
towards a flashlight at half the speed of light, the light is still
coming at you at about 300,000 km/sec.  If you run away from the
flashlight, then the light is still coming at you at 300,000 km/sec.
Photons' rest mass is an abstraction, because a photon can't ever be at
rest, or even slow down the tiniest fraction.
 
Similarly, photons attempting to rise from the center of a black hole
gravity well don't slow down and then turn around -- they're not
droplets from a squirtgun.  Instead, they follow a space-time geodesic
that is warped back on itself -- that is, they go in a straight line,
but straight lines no longer lead anywhere outside the hole.
--
Tim Maroney, Consultant, Eclectic Software, sun!hoptoad!tim
"Those who restrain desire, do so because theirs is weak enough to be
 restrained..." - Blake, "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell"
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudentim cudfnTim cudlnMaroney cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / bass randale /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: crb7q@hudson.acc.virginia.edu (bass cameron randale)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 14 Apr 89 05:39:03 GMT
Organization: University of Virginia, Charlottesville

In article <6978@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney) writes:
>
>                                           .....  In any case, like so
>much else in military strategy, it's a question of cost efficiency.  If
>the cost of building a gigaton warhead drops an order of magnitude or
>three, I guarantee the superpowers are going to build some of them.
 
      Ok, why exactly is the cost of building gigaton-yield thermonuclear
      weapons going to drop?  And if we accept that it is going to drop,
      why is the cost of a 1-megaton weapon not going to drop similarly?
      And finally, who cares what the yield of the nuclear weapons aimed
      at us is?  Which do you think is going to kill you faster?
      1) a 1 megaton weapon detonated overhead, 2) a 1000 megaton weapon
      overhead or 3) the little biological weapons that will be dropped
      simultaneously.
 
 
      On the fusion front...
      Building a weapon requires that the little hydrogens
      (of whichever variety one uses) combine in a very short time.
      It is also good (for weapons) if a whole lot of the little
      hydrogens combine in the small amount of time. Assuming that the
      lattice structure is the mediating object in "cold fusion",
      how do we require that a large number of fusions occur without
      at least locally destroying the lattice structure?
      I think that we can probably rest our little heads about
      nuclear weapons being developed from the prospective fusion discoveries.
      We already have nuclear weapons.
 
                                          dale bass
 
 
 
      crb7q@virginia.edu        or        crb7q@hudson.acc.virginia.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudencrb7q cudfnbass cudlnrandale cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Vincent Cate /  Theoretical Limits on Cold Fusion in Condensed Matter
     
Originally-From: vac@sam.cs.cmu.edu (Vincent Cate)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Theoretical Limits on Cold Fusion in Condensed Matter
Date: 14 Apr 89 06:40:30 GMT
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI

 
I have scanned in another paper on cold fusion:
 
    "Theoretical Limits on Cold Fusion in Condensed Matter"
    J. Rafelski, M. Gajda and D. Harley
    University of Arizona
    S. E. Jones
    Brigham Young University
    March 27, 1989
 
The digitized pictures of this paper (350K bytes) are in compressed
postscript files (same as for Fleischmann and Pons paper).
 
 
To get a copy of the paper:
 
    ftp unh.cs.cmu.edu
    anonymous
    anonymous
    cd /afs/cs/user/vac/ftp/rj
    binary
    mget *
    quit
 
 
To print it:
 
    source print
 
 
If you can not FTP from your location please do not send mail asking me to
type in the paper or email you all of the files.  Many UUCP nodes do not
seem to like files over 100K bytes, and I am too busy to deal with this.
If someone else is willing to mail out copies please post telling people.
Also, if someone is willing to type in the paper they should post so we do
not have several people typing it in.  There are lots of people who are
not able to FTP or do not have postscript printers so an ASCII version is
appreciated.  Thanks again to the people that typed in the first 2
papers!!
 
 
The person that sent me this paper wishes to remain anonymous.  As far as
I know, there was no copyright on this paper and I am not doing anything
wrong.  If anyone knows different please tell me ASAP.
 
    -- Vince
 
DISCLAIMER:  I am responsible for the above, really.
 
--
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudenvac cudfnVincent cudlnCate cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Chung-Pang Lai /  Re: the original papers
     
Originally-From: cplai@daisy.UUCP (Chung-Pang Lai)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: the original papers
Date: 14 Apr 89 04:03:01 GMT
Organization: Daisy Systems Corp., Mountain View, Ca.

In article <429c4f42.1b7ec@odin.engin.umich.edu> stealth@caen.engin.umic
.edu (Mike Peltier) writes:
]
]Think twice before you request these -- make sure you have disk space. :-)
]I could hardly beleive when I found out that each 3 meg PS file was one page.
]It took nearly ten minutes to print on a LaserWriter +.  I would suggest
]that someone with a Mac translate the document to a Mac wordprocessor,
]with all the fonts, symbols, etc, and translate *that* to PostScript.
]I should think that the file would be *much* smaller and much easier to read
]and to print.
]
]	-Mike Peltier	
 
Sound like the pages were scanned in as raster image and wrapped in PostScript.
The files would be much smaller if they were scanned by an OCR (Optical
Character Recognition) scanner.  The catch is that if someone has an OCR
scanner, the paper would have distributed in ASCII format in the first place!
 
--
.signature under construction ...
{pyramid, osu-cis, uunet, killer}!daisy!cplai    C.P. Lai
cplai%daisy.UUCP@uunet.UU.NET   cplai%daisy@killer.DALLAS.TX.USA
Daisy Systems Corp, 700B Middlefield Road, Mtn View CA 94039.  (415)960-6961
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudencplai cudfnChung-Pang cudlnLai cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / bass randale /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: crb7q@hudson.acc.virginia.edu (bass cameron randale)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 14 Apr 89 06:38:58 GMT
Organization: University of Virginia, Charlottesville

In article <1356@hudson.acc.virginia.edu> crb7q@hudson.acc.Virginia.EDU
(bass cameron randale) writes:
>In article <6978@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney) writes:
>>
>>                                           .....  In any case, like so
>>much else in military strategy, it's a question of cost efficiency.  If
>>the cost of building a gigaton warhead drops an order of magnitude or
>>three, I guarantee the superpowers are going to build some of them.
>
>      Ok, why exactly is the cost of building gigaton-yield thermonuclear
>      going to drop ? ...
 
 
   All this talk of gigatons and cold fusion got me to thinking.
                                                  3
   Currently, we seem to be getting ~20 Watts / cm  from our reaction.
   Now Fleischmann and Pons mention that they think if we use
   tritium, that we can do better, say ... "enthalpy releases in excess of
                3
   10 kWatt / cm."  Well, let's use tritium.  And let's say that F/P
   underestimated by an order of magnitude.  That gives us enthalpy releases
                 3
   of 100 kW / cm.
                           3
   Pd density ~= 12 gm / cm
                                        3                3
   Thus the Power density ~= 100 kW / cm   /   12 gm / cm  ~= 10 kW / gm
 
   If we generously assume a 1 second detonation time, then the
 
   Energy density = 10 kJoules / gm
                                          15
   But let's see.... 1 gigaton = 4.18 * 10   kJoules
 
   Thus our lower limit on
                           8
   Bomb weight ~= 4.18 * 10  metric tons / gigaton
 
 
   and that is roughly one order of magnitude larger than the
   weight of every man, woman and child in the U.S., in palladium.
   We aren't going to build many of them.
 
   And we're going to need one large launcher.
 
                                         dale bass
 
   crb7q@virginia.edu      or      crb7q@hudson.acc.virginia.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudencrb7q cudfnbass cudlnrandale cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Mark Zenier /  Graduate Students report Cold Fusion
     
Originally-From: markz@ssc.UUCP (Mark Zenier)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Graduate Students report Cold Fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 06:39:13 GMT
Organization: SSC, Inc., Seattle, WA

From various Seattle, Wa. media: (mostly the Seattle Times)
 
Two University of Washington students, Van Eden and Wei Liu, Graduate
Students in Physics, reported that they produced fusion in a test tube.
 
The setup was similar to the F&P/P&F experiment, except that a gold
wire was substituted for the platinum wire.  "We didn't have any platinum".
 
"After about 3 1/2 hours ... a mass spectrometer detected indications
that the reaction was creating tritium, ... . Tritium was detected
for 10 hours.
      To double check the experiment, Eden and Lui tried the same
thing with regular water.
      No tritium was generated strengthening the evidence that fusion
had taken place when heavy water was used.
      Then the students repeated the experiment with heavy water and
believed they again observed tritium.
      ....
      But Eden and Lui said they did not detect neutrons, adding that
they did not have a very sensitive neutron detector."
 
 
Anybody at the U Dub have any inside info?
 
Mark Zenier    uunet!nwnexus!pilchuck!ssc!markz    markz@ssc.uucp
                            uunet!amc!
                      uw-beaver!tikal!
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudenmarkz cudfnMark cudlnZenier cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Robert Woodhead /  Re: Washington Post 4/13
     
Originally-From: trebor@biar.UUCP (Robert J Woodhead)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Washington Post 4/13
Date: 14 Apr 89 03:16:45 GMT
Organization: Biar Games, Inc.

In article <19606@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu> beckman@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu
(Peter Beckman) writes:
>"...MIT and UC@Berkeley also announced they have developed new
>theories of how fusion happens that, if accepted, would eliminate the
>apparent contradiction with the existing theory. MIT officials said
>the university has applied for patents on several technologies based
>on its theory, but refused to disclose details."
 
I'm both amused and _shocked_ by the announcement that MIT is rushing
publication of _4_ papers by _1_ researcher purporting to explain the
cold fusion results, _and_ attempting to patent them.
 
First of all, it's blantant "shotgunning", and secondly, I am very
dubious as to the value of such "patent applications".  Last time I
checked, patents were for novel inventions and/or processes (the P+F
device fits both categories), not for explanations of why something
works.  If the MIT "patents" as described here in alt.fusion and
the media are approved (heavy doubts from this layman), then I for
one will attempt to patent my novel explanation of "why the sky is
blue", and get rich collecting royalties each time a parent explains
this fact of nature to his/her child.
 
Looks like the MIT PR and Licensing people have gone overboard.  But
then, from their point of view, the worst they can get is a nice
association of "MIT" with "cold fusion"; the "patents", if denied,
won't rate mention on the nightly news.
 
Skeptically,
 
--
Robert J Woodhead, Biar Games, Inc.  ...!uunet!biar!trebor | trebor@biar.UUCP
"The NY Times is read by the people who run the country.  The Washington Post
is read by the people who think they run the country.   The National Enquirer
is read by the people who think Elvis is alive and running the country..."
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudentrebor cudfnRobert cudlnWoodhead cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / J Dow /  Re: heavy water/alcohol
     
Originally-From: jdow@gryphon.COM (J. Dow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Re: heavy water/alcohol
Date: 14 Apr 89 09:40:33 GMT
Organization: Wizardess Designs, Hermosa Beach, Ca.

In article <733@nsscb.UUCP> det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow) writes:
>>the right mixture of the two cancels the
>>effect by balancing the density differences.
>
>If the heavy water is harmless otherwise, and it diffuses into
>the canal fast enough, there might be a commercial application here.
>It wouldn't address response/reflex times unless... how about
>coffee made with heavy water as an after drinks drink?
>-nsscb!det
 
Even better yet - heavy ethanol!
 
--
Sometimes a bird in the hand leaves a sticky deposit.
Perhaps it were best it remain there in the bush with the other one.
 
{@_@}
	jdow on bix (where else?)	Sometimes the dragon wins. Sometimes
	jdow@gryphon.CTS.COM		the knight. Does the fair maiden ever
	{backbone}!gryphon!jdow		win? Surely both the knight and dragon
					stink. Maybe the maiden should suicide?
					Better yet - she should get an Amiga and
					quit playing with dragons and knights.
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudenjdow cudfnJ cudlnDow cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Yosi Hoshen /  Re: Cold fusion with normal water
     
Originally-From: jho@ihlpe.ATT.COM (Yosi Hoshen)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion with normal water
Date: 14 Apr 89 02:03:51 GMT
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories - Naperville, Illinois

>Richard Harris reported on NPR this morning that Stanly Pons stated at an
>American Chemical Society meeting yesterday that he has been trying the
>cold fusion experiment with normal water during the last several weeks, and
>produced a reaction similar to, although not as strong as, that produced
>when using heavy water. Virtually no details were given. Harris also
>reported that Pons said that the normal water experiments were not very
>interesting.
 
I think that the H2O experiment is the most important to do.  It is very
unlikely that H would go fusion.  In pure water the concentration
of D is very small to be significant in H+D reaction.  if
the above quote is accurate it is disapponting for energy generation.
It seems that some nuclear reaction is taking place.
Another experiment that should be done is to measure the quanities
of free O2 and D2 released.  This is directly proportional to
the amount of charge that is transferred between the electrodes
according to Faraday's law.  If there is deviation from
Faraday's law then the O and the D participate in some reaction
which could be responsible for the heat generation.
 
Yosi Hoshen
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudenjho cudfnYosi cudlnHoshen cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 /  fusion@zorch.U /  Submission for Alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: fusion@zorch.UU.NET
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Submission for Alt.fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 08:39:00 GMT
Organization: Alt.fusion/Mail Gateway

Posters too numerous to credit/blame have suggested that heat observed
by Pons and Fleischmann, and also Texas A&M, might be the result of
releasing energy stored during the dueterium ``charging'' period, making
the P&F cell merely ``an interesting battery''. I think we can ``put
paid'' to this thread, for the following two reasons (throughout this
posting I assume that all experiments cited have been performed by
researchers who are competent, at least within their own fields):
 
1)  The Texas A&M result (using a Pd rod baked out at 600 C to remove
  any intial stored hydrogen), observed heat almost immeadiately, i.e.
  without P&F's ``charging period''. Similarly, Georgia Tech, using a
  special surface treatment on their Pd electrode, observed neutron
  emission immeadiately. No ``charging period'' ==> no (or very little)
  ``stord energy'', ergo the P&F cell is not (primarily) acting as a
  battery.
 
2)  Contrawise, the P&F results do not show any excess heat release
  until *after* the Pd is almost saturated with Deuterium. But if the
  Pd is saturated, and if the ``charging'' current is not decreased,
  then all that will happen is that the Deuterium stored in the Pd will
  *stay* in the Pd, while the newly formed Deuterium will bubble to to
  surface rather than diffusing into the Pd. The heat released into the
  cell is therfore just the ``Joule heat'',  *minus* the ``heat of
  formation'' of D2O (since it took energy to break the D-O bonds), i.e.
  *less* than the electrical power fed in; whereas P&F report up to 4.25
  times *more* heat released than the power fed in.
 
Actually, the idea that one had to *expend* energy to get the Deuterium
into the Pd is really pretty rediculous. Think, People! Hydrogen *likes*
to live in the Pd lattice! That means stored Hydrogen must be in a *lower*
energy state than free Hydrogen: putting H (or D) into Pd is an *exo*thermic
reaction! This should be obvious from the fact that Texas A&M degassed
their Pd by *baking* it, not *freezing* it!
 
Lest someone say ``A-HA! *That's* were the heat is coming from!'', let
me observe that:
 
1)  If this were the case, P&F would observe the rate of heat release to
  initially be a *maximum*, which then decays to zero as the Pd approaches
  saturation; on the contrary, they claim *negligable* heat released *until*
  the   Pd becomes about *60%* saturated. Also, both P&F and Texas A&M claim
  that the heat output is steady with time, rather than decaying, in the
  former case for a period of at least 120 hours.
 
2)  P&F report that in their longest runs, energy released was about
  5MJ/cm^3 (yes, that's *mega*joules), which is far too much energy for
  a merely chemical process to be involved. While I haven't been able to
  find a reference for the amount of heat released by Hydrogen, let alone
  Deuterium, upon absorption into Pd, I can readily estimate it: using the
  P&F figure of 0.8eV per hydrogen trapping site (which, even if not accurate,
  is at least of the correct order of magnitude for a chemical reaction),
  density (12.0 gm/cm^3) and atomic weight (106.7 gm/mole) of Pd, I get
  77 kcal/mole of D absorbed, or about 36 kcal/cm^3 of Pd. These are quite
  reasonable figures for chemical processes, but far too small to explain
  the P&F result.
 
Finally, to all those who argue that P&F simply screwed up their calorimetry:
come on!!! Pons and Fleischmann are both well known and repected electro-
chemists. That's probably the part of the experiment they are *least*
likely to have screwed up! They aren't *stupid*, they're just *chemists*,
not physicists!
 
As for what the reaction-mechanism is, further deponent sayeth not; I
lack the proper information, just like the rest of us. Until someone
performs calorimetry *and* particle detection *simultaneously*, all I
can do is *postulate* that P&F and Texas A&M's reaction goes via the
same channel as BYU and Georgia Tech's, and conclude that *if* this is
the case, the reaction must be nuclear, but aneutronic and ``agamma''
--- which, regretably, leaves me with nothing currently known, and I'm
back to ad-hoc hypotheses again.
 
Unfortunately, the bloody chemists all seem to be doing calorimetry,
while the bloody physicists seem to be doing neutron and gamma detection.
Why the heck can't at least *one* group cross the totally man-made
boundary-lines between disciplines? Are we going to have to wait until a
*nuclear* chemist tries this thing???
 
 
Gordon D. Pusch        |     puschgd@vtcc1.bitnet
Physics Dept., VPI&SU  |
Blacksburg VA 24061    |
 
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| "... Engineers ... Always *changin'* things ...                       |
|  It's like a Dam' *Computer Center* in here ..." --- L.E. McCoy, M.D. |
|                                                                       |
| Q: How many System Programmers does it take to screw in a light-bulb? |
| A: *ONE*; He holds the bulb, and the World revolves around him ...    |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
 
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudenfusion cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 /  fusion@zorch.U /  Submission for Alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: fusion@zorch.UU.NET
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Submission for Alt.fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 07:51:00 GMT
Organization: Alt.fusion/Mail Gateway

Posters too numerous to credit/blame have suggested that heat observed
by Pons and Fleischmann, and also Texas A&M, might be the result of
releasing energy stored during the dueterium ``charging'' period, making
the P&F cell merely ``an interesting battery''. I think we can ``put
paid'' to this thread, for the following two reasons (throughout this
posting I assume that all experiments cited have been performed by
researchers who are competent, at least within their own fields):
 
1)  The Texas A&M result (using a Pd rod baked out at 600 C to remove
  any intial stored hydrogen), observed heat almost immeadiately, i.e.
  without P&F's ``charging period''. Similarly, Georgia Tech, using a
  special surface treatment on their Pd electrode, observed neutron
  emission immeadiately. No ``charging period'' ==> no (or very little)
  ``stord energy'', ergo the P&F cell is not (primarily) acting as a
  battery.
 
2)  Contrawise, the P&F results do not show any excess heat release
  until *after* the Pd is almost saturated with Deuterium. But if the
  Pd is saturated, and if the ``charging'' current is not decreased,
  then all that will happen is that the Deuterium stored in the Pd will
  *stay* in the Pd, while the newly formed Deuterium will bubble to to
  surface rather than diffusing into the Pd. The heat released into the
  cell is therfore just the ``Joule heat'',  *minus* the ``heat of
  formation'' of D2O (since it took energy to break the D-O bonds), i.e.
  *less* than the electrical power fed in; whereas P&F report up to 4.25
  times *more* heat released than the power fed in.
 
Actually, the idea that one had to *expend* energy to get the Deuterium
into the Pd is really pretty rediculous. Think, People! Hydrogen *likes*
to live in the Pd lattice! That means stored Hydrogen must be in a *lower*
energy state than free Hydrogen: putting H (or D) into Pd is an *exo*thermic
reaction! This should be obvious from the fact that Texas A&M degassed
their Pd by *baking* it, not *freezing* it!
 
Lest someone say ``A-HA! *That's* were the heat is coming from!'', let
me observe that:
 
1)  If this were the case, P&F would observe the rate of heat release to
  initially be a *maximum*, which then decays to zero as the Pd approaches
  saturation; on the contrary, they claim *negligable* heat released *until*
  the   Pd becomes about *60%* saturated. Also, both P&F and Texas A&M claim
  that the heat output is steady with time, rather than decaying, in the
  former case for a period of at least 120 hours.
 
2)  P&F report that in their longest runs, energy released was about
  5MJ/cm^3 (yes, that's *mega*joules), which is far too much energy for
  a merely chemical process to be involved. While I haven't been able to
  find a reference for the amount of heat released by Hydrogen, let alone
  Deuterium, upon absorption into Pd, I can readily estimate it: using the
  P&F figure of 0.8eV per hydrogen trapping site (which, even if
not accurate, is certainly of the correct order of magni-
  is at least the correct order of magnitude for a chemical reaction),
and the density (12.0 gm/cm^3) and atomic
  denstiy (12.0 gm/cm^3) and atomic weight (106.7 gm/mole) of Pd, I get
  77 kcal/mole of D absorbed, or about 36 kcal/cm^3 of Pd. These are quite
  reasonable figures for chemical processes, but far too small to explain the
  P&F result.
 
Finally, to all those who argue that P&F simply screwed up their calorimetry:
come on!!! Pons and Fleischmann are both well known and repected electro-
chemists. That's probably the part of the experiment they are *least*
likely to have screwed up! They aren't *stupid*, they're just *chemists*,
not physicists!
 
As for what the reaction-mechanism is, further deponent sayeth not; I
lack the proper information, just like the rest of us. Until someone
performs calorimetry *and* particle detection *simultaneously*, all I
can do is *postulate* that P&F and Texas A&M's reaction goes via the
same channel as BYU and Georgia Tech's, and conclude that *if* this is
the case, the reaction must be nuclear, but aneutronic and ``agamma''
--- which, regretably, leaves me with nothing currently known, and I'm
back to ad-hoc hypotheses again.
 
Unfortunately, the bloody chemists all seem to be doing calorimetry,
while the bloody physicists seem to be doing neutron and gamma detection.
Why the heck can't at least *one* group cross the totally man-made
boundary-lines between disciplines? Are we going to have to wait until a
*nuclear* chemist tries this thing???
 
 
Gordon D. Pusch        |     puschgd@vtcc1.bitnet
Physics Dept., VPI&SU  |
Blacksburg VA 24061    |
 
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| "... Engineers ... Always *changin'* things ...                       |
|  It's like a Dam' *Computer Center* in here ..." --- L.E. McCoy, M.D. |
|                                                                       |
| Q: How many System Programmers does it take to screw in a light-bulb? |
| A: *ONE*; He holds the bulb, and the World revolves around him ...    |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
 
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudenfusion cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.13 / LTH server /  Re: Swedish patent
     
Originally-From: newsuser@LTH.Se (LTH network news server)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Swedish patent
Date: 13 Apr 89 23:59:52 GMT
Organization: Lund Institute of Technology, Sweden

 
In article <4706@pt.cs.cmu.edu> Jon Webb writes:
>In article <739@nsscb.UUCP>, det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow) writes:
>> >| 	A swedish engineer patended a method for producing helium from
>> >| 	hydrogen with Palladium back in 1926 (nineteenhundredtwentiesix).
>> >
>> >  I got a note from someone else about this, and they said the process
>> >had never been a commercial success because it generated too much heat.
>> >Can someone with access to Swedish patent files check this? If true, it
>> >would be a great joke (if you like irony).
 
>I don't know if this is the origin of the rumor, but Chemical
>Abstracts gives a few references to papers by Fritz Paneth on the
>synthesis of He from H in 1927.  He tried using palladium (!) and
>electron discharge tubes and looked for helium.  Initially his results
>were positive, but he later eliminated some sources of helium
>contamination and eventually completely retracted the earlier work.
>I think that if a Swede did patent a working method for production of
>He from H in 1926 (a logical time, by the way -- it seems that there
>were several groups trying this) his work would not have been ignored.
 
The swedish technical newspaper "Ny teknik" treats the subject in its
latest number 15:1989.
 
According to that article Professor John Tandberg (born i Norway 1896)
applied for a swedish patent on Feb 17, 1927. The title was "A
method for production of helium". Tandberg was at the moment head of
the Electrolux labs in Stockholm.
 
In the 1920s Germany was making powerful efforts to obtain large
amounts of helium for their airships. At the university of Berlin the
chemists Fritz Paneth and Kurt Peters was studying methods with
hydrogen absorbtion in palladium. They claimed that they were partly
successful, but could only produce very small quantities.
 
Tandberg tried to improve their method. He worked with hydrogen and
palladium under high pressure and with electrolysis.
 
In his application Tandberg mentions a method "characterized by that
the reaction tank is in thermal contact with an instrument which
transfers the produced heat to a technically useful state".
 
The patent application was returned with the words "read, but not
understood", and on Nov 17 the same year the application was rejected
with the motivation that "the description is not so complete that a
competent person could use it to use the invention".
 
(Disclaimer: All of the above is qouted from the refereced article. I
have no further knowledge in this matter.)
 
- Anders
 
---
 
Anders Landin
University of Lund
Dept. of Computer Engineering    Phone:   +46-46-10 75 79 or +46-46-10 75 20
P.O. Box 118                     Telefax: +46-46-10 47 14
S-221 00 LUND                    Internet: landin@dit.lth.se
Sweden                           or landin%dit.lth.se@uunet.uu.net
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / L Eriksson /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: lhe@sics.se (Lars-Henrik Eriksson)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 08:37:16 GMT
Organization: Swedish Institute of Computer Science, Stockholm (Kista), Sweden

In article <1578@wasatch.utah.edu>, jacobs%cmos (Steven R. Jacobs) writes:
>Er, no.  Photons do *NOT* have mass.  They could not travel
>at the speed of light if they did have mass.  Photons are
 
Photons do have mass, but not rest mass.
 
Lars-Henrik Eriksson				Internet: lhe@sics.se
Swedish Institute of Computer Science		Phone (intn'l): +46 8 752 15 09
Box 1263					Telefon (nat'l): 08 - 752 15 09
S-164 28  KISTA, SWEDEN
--
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / L Augustsson /  Re: Swedish patent
     
Originally-From: augustss@cs.chalmers.se (Lennart Augustsson)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Swedish patent
Date: 14 Apr 89 12:33:04 GMT
Organization: Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden

Since I have an article from the Swedish semitechnical journal "Ny Teknik"
about cold fusion in the twenties, I'll summarize.
 
There was no patent, only a patent application.  On the February 17th
1927 John Tandberg filed a patent application for "S\"att f\"or
framst\"allning av helium" ("A way to produce helium").  The
application was rejected because it was "not complete enough for an
expert to use the invention".  John Tandberg was a (Norwegian born)
Swedish professor in Lund that did research for the Electrolux company.
 
Tandberg got his idea from the Germans Fritz Paneth and Kurt Peters
who also tried to make helium from oxygen in Berlin in the mid
twenties.  The reason for this was that USA didn't want to export
helium to (almost nazi) Germany.
 
After the discovery of deuterium in 1932 Tandberg also tried using
this.  With the equipment he used he didn't detect any radioactivity.
How much enery he got out of it is hard to tell, he was only
interested in the helium!
 
	-- Lennart Augustsson
 
 
	Lennart Augustsson
Email:	augustss@cs.chalmers.se or augustss@chalmers.csnet
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 /  Eduardo /  D20 For Sale
     
Originally-From: ekrell@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com (Eduardo Krell[dgb])
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,misc.invest
Subject: D20 For Sale
Date: 14 Apr 89 15:01:08 GMT
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill

An ad in today's Wall Street Journal reads:
 
		99.9%
 
		D2O
 
		for
 
	Nuclear Fusion Studies
 
It then gives a phone number to call.
Someone is already making lots of money out of this.
--
 
    Eduardo Krell                   AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill
 
    {att,decvax,ucbvax}!ulysses!ekrell	Internet: ekrell@ulysses.att.com
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Ethan Vishniac /  Ga. Tech withdraws claims
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Ga. Tech withdraws claims
Date: 14 Apr 89 15:40:20 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

Today I read in the newspaper that the Georgia Tech group was
withdrawing its claims of neutron detection from a cold fusion
experiment.  It seems that they had used a neutron detector
of such sensitivity (and fragility) that minor perturbations
to its temperature could result in false detections.  They
said that people from a few different labs had called them up
after their press conference and cautioned them and that they
were repeating their experiment using special precautions to
keep their neutron detector at a constant temperature.
 
In other words, maybe they saw something and maybe they didn't.
 
When I read the article my first thought was "gee, I'm glad I'm
not them".  On second thought I realized that over the years there
have been a few occasions when theoretical results I was pretty sure
of turned out to be wrong.  When this has happened I withdrew the paper
before publication, resolved to be more careful, and went about my
business.  The enormous pressure here for immediate release of
results is going to result in more than a few embarassments before
this is over.  These people should be congratulated for their courage
in immediately retracting their previous results as premature.
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Paul Meyer /  Re: Graduate Students report Cold Fusion
     
Originally-From: paul@mit-caf.MIT.EDU (Paul Meyer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Graduate Students report Cold Fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 14:55:37 GMT
Organization: Microsystems Technology Laboratories, MIT

In article <1899@ssc.UUCP> markz@ssc.UUCP (Mark Zenier) writes:
>
>Two University of Washington students, Van Eden and Wei Liu, Graduate
>Students in Physics, reported that they produced fusion in a test tube.
>
>"After about 3 1/2 hours ... a mass spectrometer detected indications
>that the reaction was creating tritium, ... . Tritium was detected
>for 10 hours.
>      To double check the experiment, Eden and Lui tried the same
>thing with regular water.
>      No tritium was generated strengthening the evidence that fusion
>had taken place when heavy water was used.
 
	Talking to a Chemist grad student here, it appears that the
set up used by the Washington students is a known way of enriching
tritium.  There is tritium in heavy water.  The palladium may simply
be allowing tritium through the electrode.  The reason it would not
work with plain H20 is simply because there is much less tritium in
water than in D20.
	Can anyone confirm or deny these allegations?  It seems reasonable
to me.  I still believe UU and the other places are seeing fusion, but
I'm not convinced by the Washington students.
 
 
--
| Paul Meyer   				| Two more months and counting...    |
| paul@caf.mit.edu			|   "You killed my true love"  	     |
| Microsystems Technology Laboratory	|   "It's possible.  I kill a lot    |
| MIT					|   of people."			     |
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Dave Mack /  Re: Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion
     
Originally-From: mack@inco.UUCP (Dave Mack)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 14:29:59 GMT
Organization: McDonnell Douglas-INCO, McLean, VA

In article <24162@beta.lanl.gov> mwj@beta.lanl.gov (William Johnson) writes:
>Now the disturbing pattern is the following: there appears to be a strong
>ANTIcorrelation between the willingness of a given institution to announce
>positive results in confirming F&P, and the "professionalism" with which that
>institution can attack the problem, based on their available resources and
>known expertise in both electrochemistry and nuclear physics.
>
>Consider, please, the list of eminent laboratories that have NOT confirmed
>F&P.  Los Alamos, Oak Ridge, Argonne, Livermore, Berkeley, Harvard, MIT,
>Stanford, Brookhaven (they have retracted their claim of confirmation, I
>believe), Bell Labs, CERN ... the list goes on and on.  These institutions
>have more in common than good reputations: they also have cadres of
>"professional" physicists who can bring a LOT of years' expertise to bear
>on the experiments, coupled with (I don't approve of this, but it's true)
>considerably more potent experimental apparatus than even most major
>universities have.  So why is it that we are now seeing articles that
>start "In a press conference today, grad students at the University of X
>reported [possible] experimental confirmation of cold fusion", and no such
>announcement from these other places?
 
1. The national labs work under rigid security rules. The people working
there cannot simply hold impromptu press conferences if they make a neat
discovery. It has to be filtered through a very viscous layer of bureaucracy.
 
2. Many scientists would be unwilling to make an announcement until they
had a reasonably firm understanding of the theoretical basis for their
results. It is quite possible that cold fusion has been duplicated at
several of the institutions you mention, but the theoretical foundation
for cold fusion is unclear, so no announcement. However, it has been
reported that people at MIT think they *have* arrived at a theoretical
explanation and are applying for a patent as a result. (Given the fact
that others made the discovery, and that MIT earlier announced that it
could not reproduce the F&P results, this could be one of the most
interesting patent battles in recent history.)
 
3. Please remember why F&P made their announcement: word of the experiment
had already leaked out, and they were afraid that someone would accidentally
duplicate the experimental configuration that went to "ignition", to use
their term. Continued silence on their part might have meant someone's
death. (A more cynical person might wonder if F&P had heard about the
BYU group and decided to make a preemptive announcement.)
 
4. The experiment is trivial to reproduce, but difficult to make
quantitative measurements on. The "Big Guns" may not be willing to
go on record until they've put together a well-designed, controlled
experiment that simultaneously does calorimetry and nuclear chemistry
measurements. Except for F&P, every group announcing a result has
done one or the other, but not both.
 
Frankly, I'd be absolutely amazed if every fusion lab in the country
isn't trying to reproduce F&P. I can almost hear the sound of multi-million
dollar tokamak and laser-ICF budgets crumbling.
 
--
Dave Mack
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Jay Maynard /  Re: WHY HAVEN'T WE SEEN THIS MATERIAL BEFORE???
     
Originally-From: jay@splut.UUCP (Jay "you ignorant splut!" Maynard)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: WHY HAVEN'T WE SEEN THIS MATERIAL BEFORE???
Date: 14 Apr 89 14:25:01 GMT
Organization: Confederate Microsystems, League City, TX

In article <1492@Portia.Stanford.EDU> joe@hanauma.UUCP (Joe Dellinger) writes:
>Despite their lack of computer expertise, the Physics dept there is
>pretty impressive. They were a big reason Dallas got the SSC.
>(PS: Texas A+M is not near Dallas, Houston, or any other large city.)
 
Actually, in the Texas scale of things, they're close to Houston and
Austin: about 90 miles. An hour-and-a-half drive. (Or a 45-minute
flight!)
 
--
Jay Maynard, EMT-P, K5ZC, PP-ASEL   | Never ascribe to malice that which can
uucp:        uunet!nuchat!   (eieio)| adequately be explained by stupidity.
    hoptoad!academ!uhnix1!splut!jay +----------------------------------------
{killer,bellcore}!texbell!          | "Less great!" "Tastes filling!"
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Peter Desnoyers /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: desnoyer@Apple.COM (Peter Desnoyers)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 14 Apr 89 17:10:46 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA

In article <6991@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney) writes:
>In article <28901@apple.Apple.COM> desnoyer@Apple.COM (Peter Desnoyers) writes:
  [calculations of blast damage]
>>  - thus the radius of destruction of a 1 gigaton bomb would be about
>>    100 miles. (!!!) However, the same area could be destroyed by 100
>>    1 megaton bombs, requiring 1/10th as many missiles. (assuming
>>    weight is proportional to yield, which is probably reasonable for
>>    large bombs of the similar technologies.)
>
>Uh, 1/10 as many missiles?  Don't you mean 1/10 the explosive yield,
>but 100 times as many missiles?
 
No, I meant 1/10 as many missiles. The payload of a missile is
measured in pounds, not number of warheads. Of course, I forgot that
you can't deliver one bomb with many missiles. However, if your
gigaton bomb weighs 1000 times a megaton bomb (which may not be the
case) then the missile that launches it could loft 1000 1 megaton
warheads. (and probably a few space shuttles to boot.)
 
>[points out that new bomb technologies change the tradeoff.]
agreed.
 
>
>Finally, remember that circles don't tile a plane.  Sure, either a
>one-gigaton bomb or 100 one-megaton bombs will cover a total of 31,415
>square miles, but there's going to be significant overlap among the 100
>blasts if you want complete coverage.
 
And, vice versa, most targets are less than 200 miles in diameter. If
your biggest target can be destroyed by an X megaton blast, bigger
bombs are futile. [of course, most of these things are futile anyway,
but that's beside the point.]
 
>--
>Tim Maroney, Consultant, Eclectic Software, sun!hoptoad!tim
>"Superhero stories could best be described as entertainment that externalizes
> childhood power fantasies." -- Timothy Fay on rec.arts.comics
 
				Peter Desnoyers
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Prasad Devineni /  Re: U. grad student explains'cold fusion research
     
Originally-From: fe-dpa@wasatch.utah.edu (Prasad Devineni)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: U. grad student explains'cold fusion research
Date: 14 Apr 89 16:24:29 GMT
Organization: University of Utah, College of Engineering

Source: The Daily Utah Chronicle Friday, April 14,1989.
 
{excerpts}
 
{There will be special focus issue about fusion}
By Edward Ruiz, Chronicle assistant news editor
 
The University of Utah chemistru graduate student who was a key player
in the U. cold fusion experiment spoke to colleagues at a chemistry
seminar Thursday to technically explain the mechanism of the now-famous
experiment.
 
Marwin Hawkins, who has worked with B. Stanley Pons since October, spoke
to about 80 students and faculty of the chemistry department in a low-key
seminar. The seminar was designed to exclude the media and the rest of
the campus from attending as a courtesy to Hawkins' collegues who wanted
to hear technical information on the experiment, a simple electrochemical
cell.
 
In reiterating what Pons and his British collegue, Martin Fleischmann,
have said about their experiment, Hawkins noted that although the results
 of the experiment can only be explained by fusion-- or a new process
unknown to scientists--further testing must be made to positively indicate
there is fusion reaction.
 
Also, because the amount of neutrons detected by the U.research has been
extremely lower than physicists have claimed would be present if it were
a fusion reaction, Hawkins said there are unexplained reactions occurring
that produce the heat but not the neutrons. Physicists contend that if the
reaction is fusion, then there should have been enough neutrons emitted
to kill the researchers.
 
"There aren't as many neutrons as people say there should be--I'm living
proof of that," he said.
 
Hawkins explained explained after after the seminar that "there are other
processes that are not necessarily neutron producers. There may be neutron
producers as well as neutron consumers going on at the same time."
 
In discussing the controversial reaction, which produces four times as
much energy than put into it while not producing many neutrons, Hawkins
alluded to a Los Angeles Times article published Thursday that reported
a scientist at the MIT claimed to have provided a theory for explaining the
process that occurs in the experiment.
 
{few lines about MIT's announcement}
 
In another fusion development, the Deseret News reported Thursday that
L. Carl Jensen, a physics professor at Salt Lake Community College, said
 he has been developing a theory on matter/anti matter that explains the
reaction in the U.experiment.
 
Jensen is quoted as saying, "The present theories don't even allow a thermal
a thermal-nuclear reaction to give this much energy. Certainly, no chemical
reaction could produce this result. Only a matter/anti matter reaction
converts 100 percent of current mass to  energy, and no neutrons are left
behind. This fits very well the facts at the U. You don't see many neutrons
 because they are annihilated in the matter/anti matter reaction."
 
{Obviously I couldn't attend the seminar since I am in Fuels Engg.,}
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Ted Dunning /  Re: Graduate Students report Cold Fusion
     
Originally-From: ted@nmsu.edu (Ted Dunning)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Graduate Students report Cold Fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 16:07:16 GMT
Organization: NMSU Computer Science

 
 
the currents mentioned in the postings on the uw work (1mA at 10V) may
indicate that no electrolyte was used.  could somebody clarify this?
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / William Johnson /  Re: n + palladium
     
Originally-From: mwj@beta.lanl.gov (William Johnson)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: n + palladium
Date: 14 Apr 89 04:18:06 GMT
Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory

In article <10250@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU>, ttwang@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Thomas Wang) writes:
> I am interested in hearing what would happen if a neutron hits a palladium
> nucleus.  Would this cause fission to occur?  If the palladium swallows up
> the neutron, does this explain the lack of neutron emission?
 
No, and probably not.
 
To be less brief: capture of a neutron by palladium would result in the
emission of characteristic gamma radiation, but not in "fission".  These
gamma rays should be easily detected -- if one is looking for them.
 
Getting the neutron swallowed is the hard part.  All of the reasonable
(read: known heretofore) d+d reactions lead to neutrons with energies of
a few MeV, except of course the ones that don't lead to neutrons at all.
Neutrons that energetic tend not to react with nuclei very efficiently; they
just bounce around until they lose enough energy, through plain old elastic
scattering, to be "thermalized", i.e., have energies of about 0.025 eV --
not MeV (million electron volts), just 1/40 of one electron volt.  Passage
through several centimeters of water or polyethylene, or through much
greater thicknesses of non-hydrogenous material, is required for this to
occur.  Simply put, the neutron doesn't stay around for the palladium to
eat it.  Any mechanism for producing "cold" neutrons that stay put and get
eaten by the palladium would require -- have you heard this before? --
brand new physics.
 
The measurements required to look for the gamma radiation that a fusion
reaction might emit aren't all that difficult, but they do require some
specialized instrumentation that only practicing gamma-ray spectroscopists
have, plus the knowledge to avoid some experimental pitfalls.  One thing I
find disappointing about several of the alleged "confirmations" is that
no nuclear physicists were involved.  Texas A&M and the U of Washington
both have solid programs in nuclear chemistry or physics; participation
in the A&M/U of W experiments by some of those people would have made the
experiments a lot more credible.
--
"One thing they don't tell you about doing	| Bill Johnson
experimental physics is that sometimes you	| Los Alamos Nat'l Laboratory
must work under adverse conditions ... like	| {!cmcl2!lanl!mwj}
a state of sheer terror." (W. K. Hartmann)	| (mwj@lanl.gov)
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Mic Lacey /  F&P Paper - text version
     
Originally-From: mic@sun.soe.clarkson.edu (Mic Lacey)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: F&P Paper - text version
Date: 14 Apr 89 17:06:57 GMT
Organization: Clarkson University, Potsdam, NY

I appoligise if this question is being asked for the gizillionth time but
 
Does anyone have a text file of the F&P paper?
 
I have been trying to keep current with this newsgroup, but I believe that
I have missed an announcement about someone having the F&P paper as a text
file, there have been a couple of articles recently posted that suggest
that the F&P paper is availible in this format.
 
thanx.
 
		-Mic
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / William Johnson /  Confirmations and the high-T-superconductivity precedent
     
Originally-From: mwj@beta.lanl.gov (William Johnson)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Confirmations and the high-T-superconductivity precedent
Date: 14 Apr 89 15:31:32 GMT
Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory

In article <11996@ut-emx.UUCP>, ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
[a good, thoughtful article on what it means to be a "top-notch" place;
but what really caught my eye was ...]
>
> Am I surprised that this experiment has been confirmed at Georgia Tech
> and Texas A&M before (for example) CalTech?  Not particularly.  Just
> ask yourself where most of the high temperature superconductivity
> work has been done in this country.  Was it Princeton?  No?
> What was that you said?  University of Houston?  University of
> Alabama?  Who ever heard of them?
 
An interesting matter of historical perspective is raised by this.  Can anyone
remember how the "confirmations" of high-Tc superconductivity spread through
the physics community?
 
One of the real key features of that work was that *anyone* could verify it
within just a couple of weeks of its announcement.  This extremely high
reproducibility is not being observed with F&P, even though some potent --
and hungry, Ethan -- teams are working on it.  (As an aside, let it be noted
that one form of hunger is hunger for publicity.)  If someone who followed
the superconductivity work more closely than I did would summarize its
"confirmation" for the net, I would be grateful, and I suspect that some
other people would too.  The analogy to F&P is meaningful -- and disturbing.
 
--
"One thing they don't tell you about doing	| Bill Johnson
experimental physics is that sometimes you	| Los Alamos Nat'l Laboratory
must work under adverse conditions ... like	| {!cmcl2!lanl!mwj}
a state of sheer terror." (W. K. Hartmann)	| (mwj@lanl.gov)
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Ethan Vishniac /  Re: My previous comments about fusion experiments.
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: My previous comments about fusion experiments.
Date: 14 Apr 89 14:01:32 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <7733@phoenix.Princeton.EDU>, mbkennel@phoenix.Princeton.EDU
(Matthew B. Kennel) writes:
 
> I have to stand up for my department; PU does have a very active
> _theoretical_ program in high T_c superconductors (Basically Anderson & his
> groupies) but as you state, the high-powered experimental work comes from
> other labs.
 
Well, since the original discussion was in terms of priority in
experimental work I didn't see the need for qualifiers.  Obviously
a lot of good theoretical work has been done at places I didn't
mention, including some of the universities under discussion.
 
>
> Does this mean, that for Astrophysics (presumably your subject) you'd
> be more likely to work in the Ivies?  By Ivy League, do you include MIT?
> You can't say that they're weak in engineering...
 
For my subject (which is astrophysics) I would rank Princeton University
as one of the best in the world.  Since I got my degree from Harvard
I'm going to refuse to discuss the place :-).  MIT is *not* an Ivy
League university.  Their astronomy program is somewhat weak, although I
greatly admire a few people there.
 
Texas A&M and Georgia Tech have no astrophysics that I'm aware of.
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Henry Spencer /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 14 Apr 89 16:34:48 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <6978@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney) writes:
>>... a really big nuclear bomb spends much of its energy "making
>>the rubble bounce" near ground zero.
>
>I was thinking more in terms of a three-mile-altitude airburst than a
>ground blast.  I don't have my references on computing the effects of
>atomic explosions any more, but a gigaton burst of this type might be
>expected to wipe out an area roughly the size of Rhode Island.  Don't
>tell me that's not strategically useful.
 
Doing it with a scattering of smaller bombs is cheaper, however.  Same
problem:  the big bomb spends a lot of its energy very thoroughly
smashing and incinerating the area directly underneath.  Unless there
is some circumstance which makes it easier to get one or two big bombs
in place (e.g. a sneak attack using a commercial airliner), the smaller
bombs are always more cost-effective.  Big bombs are simply too big a
concentration of energy to be useful.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Henry Spencer /  blind testing
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: blind testing
Date: 14 Apr 89 16:37:23 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <10248@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU> khearn@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Keith Hearn) writes:
>A single blind test is (i believe) usually when the subject doesn't
>  know he he/she/it is a control or an actual test. I assume in this
>  case you mean that the tester wouldn't know if he's doing a control
>  or the actual test, but I don't see the point. How could that make a
>  difference? ...
 
There are things like recording biases that can affect results when the
person doing the recording knows which is which.
 
However, in general it's true that these things are much less significant
when (a) the experiment does not involve humans (or animals, I guess) and
(b) the effect is large and clear-cut.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
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cuddy14 cudenhenry cudfnHenry cudlnSpencer cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Henry Spencer /  Re: A&M Experiment (was Re: Fusion newgroup proposal)
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: misc.headlines,sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: A&M Experiment (was Re: Fusion newgroup proposal)
Date: 14 Apr 89 16:41:10 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <4144@druhi.ATT.COM> neal@druhi.ATT.COM (Neal D. McBurnett) writes:
>Cold fusion is nothing new.  Sakarov predicted it in the '40s via muon
>catalasis, and it was demonstrated in the '60s.  There is an article in
>the July '87 scientific american about muon-catalyzed fusion.
 
Cold fusion that looks like it might be economically feasible is new,
though.  Muon fusion has always suffered from the fundamental problem
that muons are too expensive to make and their lifetime is too short;
both of these problems seem to be very hard to get around.  Saying
"cold fusion is nothing new" is like saying "superconductors are nothing
new" -- it's technically true but ignores very important practical issues.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudenhenry cudfnHenry cudlnSpencer cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Henry Spencer /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 14 Apr 89 17:07:16 GMT
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology

In article <6991@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney) writes:
>Uh, 1/10 as many missiles?  Don't you mean 1/10 the explosive yield,
>but 100 times as many missiles?  Delivery systems aren't cheap, you
>know.  Nor has their reliability under real wartime conditions been
>tested (thank Goddess!).  If 100 missiles are fired, some unknown
>number will go astray, possibly even knocking out some of the others.
>If two one-gigaton weapons are fired at the same target, the chances of
>one delivering the full payload is high.
 
Delivery system costs have some tendency to be roughly proportional to
payload weight.  As for reliability, Tim, you're comparing apples to
oranges:  you're proposing 100% redundancy for the big bombs and none
for the small ones.  If you fire 2 big ones and 200 small ones, with
all missiles having a reliability of 75%, there is about a 6% chance
that neither of the big ones will get through, but the chances that
as few as 100 of the small ones will get through are very small.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
cudkeys:
cuddy14 cudenhenry cudfnHenry cudlnSpencer cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Samuel Fuller /  Re: Confirmations and the high-T-superconductivity precedent
     
Originally-From: sbf10@uts.amdahl.com (Samuel Fuller)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Confirmations and the high-T-superconductivity precedent
Date: 14 Apr 89 22:26:04 GMT
Organization: Amdahl Corporation, Sunnyvale CA

In article <24173@beta.lanl.gov>, mwj@beta.lanl.gov (William Johnson) writes:
> An interesting matter of historical perspective is raised by this.  Can anyone
> remember how the "confirmations" of high-Tc superconductivity spread through
> the physics community?
 
To this interested bystander, the previous work on high-T superconductors
and the current work on low-T fusion have one important aspect in common.
That is that they both take a very different approach at solving the
problem, be it fusion or superconductivity, than that of the conventional
researcher.  In so doing, they prove that there is more than one way to
skin a cat.  I hope that in the rush to prove or disprove F&P that we not
forget that F&P have, at the very least, shown us a new way to think about
fusion and quantum physics.  Their experiment justs shows how far we
mortals are from really understanding the universe we live in.
 
BTW, wouldn't it really be nice if they could tweak their experiment so
that they didn't get any neutrons out.  Just heat.  I could certainly
live with that.8-)
 
Sam Fuller / Amdahl System Performance Architecture
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Stan Zisk /  fusion revisited
     
Originally-From: shz@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu (Stan Zisk)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: fusion revisited
Date: 14 Apr 89 21:21:22 GMT
Organization: University of Hawaii

 
 A few points brought up by a local colleague (Fanale):
 
1. The measurement of all that excess He4 is probably done by using a
mass-spec.  Then any D2 _atoms_ might act exactly like He4.
 
However, He4 could be differentiated from D2 by changing the accelerating
voltage of the input-ionizing electron beam.
 
2. During the enrichment of natural H2 (or H2O) into D2, there will also
be an enrichment of the "natural" (post-atomic-age) tritium.
 
So...is the observed He4 actually D2?  and is the observed tritium
actually a pre-existing fraction of the D2O bath?  and is the "excess
energy" the re-combination (burning) of D2 with atmospheric oxygen?
 
And if so, where do the neutrons come from?
 
(Tune in tomorrow for the next exciting episode of...)
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / bass randale /  Re: Submission for Alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: crb7q@hudson.acc.virginia.edu (bass cameron randale)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Submission for Alt.fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 20:56:18 GMT
Organization: University of Virginia, Charlottesville

In article <8904140807.AA12436@dcssvx.CC.VT.EDU> fusion@zorch.UU.NET writes:
[actually Gordon Pusch from VPISU]
>Posters too numerous to credit/blame have suggested that heat observed
>by Pons and Fleischmann, and also Texas A&M, might be the result of
>releasing energy stored during the dueterium ``charging'' period, making
>the P&F cell merely ``an interesting battery''. I think we can ``put
>
>    [justification of position deleted]
>
>Actually, the idea that one had to *expend* energy to get the Deuterium
>into the Pd is really pretty rediculous. Think, People! Hydrogen *likes*
>to live in the Pd lattice! That means stored Hydrogen must be in a *lower*
>energy state than free Hydrogen: putting H (or D) into Pd is an *exo*thermic
>reaction! This should be obvious from the fact that Texas A&M degassed
>their Pd by *baking* it, not *freezing* it!
>
>                                     ..... While I haven't been able to
>  find a reference for the amount of heat released by Hydrogen, let alone
>  Deuterium, upon absorption into Pd, I can readily estimate it: using the
>  P&F figure of 0.8eV per hydrogen trapping site (which, even
if not accurate, is certainly of the correct order of magni-
>  is at least the correct order of magnitude for a chemical reaction),
and the density (12.0 gm/cm^3) and atomic
>  denstiy (12.0 gm/cm^3) and atomic weight (106.7 gm/mole) of Pd, I get
>  77 kcal/mole of D absorbed, or about 36 kcal/cm^3 of Pd. These are quite
>  reasonable figures for chemical processes, but far too small to explain the
>  P&F result.
>
 
     I agree strongly with Mr. Pusch on the likelihood of Pons/Fleischmann
     making a silly mistake in heat balances.   As to the heat
     of adsorption of deuterium.  The literature varies but ...
 
                            2                 2                2
     Heat of absorption of   H ~ 8000 cal/mol  H = 33600 J/mol  H
 
     This is from "The Palladium-Hydrogen System" by F.A. Lewis.
 
     Notice that this shows that the desorption of deuterium is
     exothermic not endothermic and that energy (ie electromigration)
     must be supplied in order to fill the lattice with deuterium.
 
     As to using this desorption energy to melt an electrode, we once again
     have ...
     A simple back of the envelope calculation shows
     that the exothermic reaction of the desorption of deuterium
     could not cause a high enough rate of heating to melt the
     cathode.
 
                            2                 2                2
     Heat of absorption of   H ~ 8000 cal/mol  H = 33600 J/mol  H
 
                                 3
     density of Pd  =~ 12 gm / cm
 
                                                        2
     specific heat of Pd-D system = C  = 33.6 J/deg mol  H
                                     p
                                                      3
     largest Pons and Fleischmann rod volume is 1.3 cm
                                                            2
     If we liberally assume that the Pd lattice soaks up 2   H
     per Pd then the largest rod ingests ~ 0.3 mol of deuterium.
 
     Also assume for grins that the rod starts at 400K.
                   2
     If all of the  H flees the lattice simultaneously, we can determine the
     change in temperature via
 
                  C  delta T = delta Q
                   p
 
                                        2            2
                  delta Q = 33600 J/mol  H * 0.3 mol  H = 10,800 J
 
 
      So
 
                 T - 400K = (1 / 33.6) * 10800
 
      or
 
                 T ~= 500 K
 
      Of course if we halved the specific heat we would get to 600K,
      which is still not enough to melt the Pd electrode.  Note that
      we have assumed instantaneous desorption which is not realistic
      even for Pd-H.  I think that we are going to have to be more creative
      than just lattice energy to explain this one....
 
      Yours repetitively ...
 
 
                                     dale bass
 
 
             crb7q@virginia.edu    or   crb7q@hudson.acc.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 /  wyant /  Cold Fusion at the American Chemical Society
     
Originally-From: wyant@eplrx7.UUCP (wyant)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion,sci.chem
Subject: Cold Fusion at the American Chemical Society
Date: 14 Apr 89 19:33:25 GMT

 
   The American Chemical Society recently completed their meeting in Dallas.
There was a special session one evening devoted to cold fusion.  S. Pons was
one of the participants.  It would be nice if someone who attended the
conference would provide a more complete summary.  I can only relay some
second hand information.
 
   1) Georgia Tech retracted their claim to have seen cold fusion neutrons.
There was a problem with their neutron detector that produced false readings.
 
   2) In the press conference that preceded the special session, Pons said
that he had tried a control experiment using water (H2O) and observed some
heat generation.  This is what was reported on National Public Radio and
other media outlets.  During the technical session, Pons said that the
control experiment did not show any heat generation.  This is in agreement
with his response to the control experiment question after a talk at Indiana
Univ (and reported in this forum).
 
   3) An associate of S. Jones from Univ. of Arizona presented a possible
theory (or rationalization) for the production of fusion neutrons in Pd.
The theory supported the neutron production rate as reported by BYU but
only by making some very favorable assumptions about conditions in a metal
lattice.
 
   4) Many of the typical control experiments that were expected had not
been performed at Utah.  Changing electrolytes and metals had not been tried.
The heat production was so difficult to obtain that Pons, Fleischmann, and
one graduate student merely worked to make the experiment reproducible.
 
   5) NATURE has returned both papers submitted from Utah and BYU to
the authors with a request that more details of the experimental setup be
included.
 
   6) There remain lots of questions about the mechanism and yield of the
Utah experiment.  However, it was learned that the U.S. government has stopped
processing lithium to remove the (6)Li for several years now.  While Pons
gave no particular reason why lithium hydroxide was chosen for the electrolyte
(he was asked about this), it may be possible that the "off-the-shelf" sample
he used contained some appreciable fraction of (6)Li.
 
   Overall, there was very little new technical information reported at the
special session over what is contained in the preprints that have been FAXed
around the world.  The major research institutions ("elite" universities and
national laboratories) were conspicuous by their silence.  Individuals from
such places say that they have been unable to detect any excess heat or
neutrons after almost two weeks of trying.  Pons still says that it requires
a minimum of 10 days for the reaction to begin.  Also, Pons has neither
offered nor agreed to go anywhere else and help another lab set up a cold
fusion experiment.
 
   Well, perhaps the immediate resolution to this problem depends on the
forum to which it is presented.  The American Physical Society is scheduled
to hold a special session on cold fusion during their spring meeting in
Baltimore on May 1.  Sponsored by the nuclear physics and solid state
sections, this should be an interesting evening.  Besides, it is one that I
will be able to attend!
 
 
                                    Patrick Wyant
                                    Engineering Physics Lab
                                    E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co.
                                    Wilmington, DE  19880-0357
                                    *!uunet!eplrx7!wyant
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 /  fusion@zorch.U /  Submission for Alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: fusion@zorch.UU.NET
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Submission for Alt.fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 16:36:16 GMT
Organization: Alt.fusion/Mail Gateway

> No, they're not stupid questions.  Modern physics answers them by using
> a very counter-intuitive principle realized by Einstein.  The speed of
> light is the same regardless of your frame of reference.  If you fly
> towards a flashlight at half the speed of light, the light is still
> coming at you at about 300,000 km/sec.  If you run away from the
> flashlight, then the light is still coming at you at 300,000 km/sec.
> Photons' rest mass is an abstraction, because a photon can't ever be at
> rest, or even slow down the tiniest fraction.
>
 
  I assume that you know what you're talking about, but you are putting
it rather badly. It would be easy to assume from the above that there
would not be a notable effect from the velocity.
 
  When moving at a fractional light speed relative to an
electromagnetic source the doppler effect shifts the frequency of the
light. This is called "red shift" when measuring star's motion away
from us (expanding universe stuff) and "gotcha" when measuring speed of
a car with radar. Note that the velocity does not have to be very close
to the speed of light ;-)
 
  I hope I have broadened the original explanation sufficiently, perhaps
alt.fusion should be removed from the newsgroups list, as this is pretty
basic physics.
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Arnie Frisch /  Re: Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion
     
Originally-From: arnief@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Arnie Frisch)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 21:29:45 GMT
Organization: Tektronix Inc., Beaverton, Or.

In article <24162@beta.lanl.gov>, mwj@beta.lanl.gov (William Johnson) writes:
 
> Consider, please, the list of eminent laboratories that have NOT confirmed
> F&P.  Los Alamos, Oak Ridge, Argonne, Livermore, Berkeley, Harvard, MIT,
> Stanford, Brookhaven (they have retracted their claim of confirmation, I
 
If, in fact, you were at one of these places, working on the big
Toka's, and you tried to replicate the Pons - Fleischmann experiment -
and succeeded - you would probably want to try to figure out what was
going on before you opened your mouth and looked even more stupid.
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / John Logajan /  Georgia Tech results doubted.
     
Originally-From: logajan@ns.network.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Georgia Tech results doubted.
Date: 14 Apr 89 21:59:46 GMT
Organization: Network Systems Corp. Mpls MN

Now that the Georgia Tech neutron counts have been called into
question because of the temperature effects on the sensor, I think
we will see a new emboldenment of negative result reports.
 
The effect of this "withdrawal" will cause at least a temporary
rebound for negative commentary.
 
--
- John M. Logajan @ Network Systems; 7600 Boone Ave; Brooklyn Park, MN 55428  -
- ...rutgers!umn-cs!ns!logajan / logajan@ns.network.com / john@logajan.mn.org -
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / John R /  D20 For Sale, Refining
     
Originally-From: jrn@me.utoronto.ca ("John R. Nickerson")
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: D20 For Sale, Refining
Date: 15 Apr 89 01:27:16 GMT
Organization: Mechanical Engineering, University of Toronto

 
Since there has been some threads on refining heavy water and pricing I
thought I would add a couple clarifications about the processes and
pricing of heavy water.  I worked in the nuclear reactor thermalhydraulics
area at the Chalk River Nuclear Laboratories (for 8 years) where some the
sieve tray work for the Bruce Heavy Water Plant was done (by a Colleague).
I was also speaking to the gentleman who sells D20 for Ontario Hydro and I
thought a few points bear some further discussion. The actual process for
heavy water refinement is bithermal exchange. H2S (in itself nasty stuff)
is bubbled through water (counterflow) and the temperature is changed.
At around 80 degrees C, H2S has a greater affinity for light water than
heavy water which reverses at lower temperatures say approximately 15 degrees
C. This is the principle refining force if you will. The current production
rate at the Bruce Heavy Water Plant is 675 metric tons per year. This is
actually half of the plant's total production capability as the other half
has been mothballed. The second unit could be started up with some cost
however the majority of the current production is to supply coolant and
moderator for the Darlington Nuclear Generating Station. Actually Atomic
Energy of Canada Limited has two heavy water production plants mothballed.
One which a couple posters referred to as rusted out, is in Glace Bay, Nova
Scotia. This unit was rebuilt after numerous startup problems. The second
was the Port Hawksbury plant. The current price for a kilogram of heavy
water is ~$425 (Canadian). If you are interested in purchasing (and are a
qualified purchaser to the source) then a contact to pursue is:
 
	Ontario Hydro
	Business Operations
	700 University Avenue, C27-F1
	Toronto, Ontario M5G 1X6
  If you want a phone number, fax number or telex number then e-mail me
directly and I can give the appropriate info along with a contact name.
 
An inevitable byproduct in a CANadian Dueterium Uranium power plant is
tritium. The deposition of this and its attractiveness for fusion bomb
usage seemed to bother one poster. This seems a little odd since Candus
are good at producing plutonium. Ask the Indians how well it works in
making a nuclear bomb. While the spent fuel in most Candus stays right
at the station there are other reactors in Canada which are not the
traditional style where the fuel doesn't stay at the site and I wonder
where the particular poster thinks that spent fuel goes?
 
Note that I am not employed by these people ( I used to consult to Hydro
but no longer ditto A.E.C.L.) or have any dealings with them. I don't like
even paying my electric bills! Caveat Empor.
 
	I don't regularly read this group so if you want to follow this
up I would prefer you e-mail me.
 
 
							J.R.
						(John R. Nickerson)
--
Disclaimer:
No one looks at me, much less speaks to me... Do you think they would listen?
 John R. Nickerson
 University of Toronto
 (416) 978-7020
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / L Hutchinson /  Re: My theory.  By Ann Elk.  Ahemm Ahemm..
     
Originally-From: larryh@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Larry Hutchinson)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: My theory.  By Ann Elk.  Ahemm Ahemm..
Date: 14 Apr 89 23:54:05 GMT
Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton,  OR.

In article <10248@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU> khearn@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (Keith Hearn) writes:
>In article <4931@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM> larryh@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM
(Larry Hutchinson) writes:
>>
>
>Huh?? I thought double blind testing was when neither the researcher nor
>  the test subject knew if they were in the control or the experiment.
>  How does that apply here? do we not tell the electrolytic cell
>  whether its got the heavy water or the normal water? I don't see how
>  a double blind experiment could be appied here.
 
My idea for a double blind experiment is one where the principal researcher
makes up and documents a series of 'kits' containing light or heavy water.
His slave (grad student) would then run the experiments and work up the
results.  He would then hand back the results to the principal researcher
after scrambling the IDs again.  The principal researcher would then draw
conclusions and only then be told which samples were what.  This type
of operation would only be necessary where the effects are small and
subject to interpretation or when they are highly variable (noisy).
 
 
>Blind testing is used for medical testing to prevent placebo effects,
>  I don't see how it could be applied to physics. Am I
>  misunderstanding the meaning of single and double blind testing?
>
>Keith Hearn
 
Naturally blind testing is less important in physics than in medical testing
but it is still possible for the researcher to do unconscious things that
can affect the outcome of an experiment.  Examples might be rounding up
rather than down when reading a meter or grad cylinder or being especially
careful when setting up the real experiment relative to the control.
Another example might be throwing out 'bad' data points.
 
 
Larry Hutchinson, Tektronix, Inc. PO Box 500, MS 50-383, Beaverton, OR 97077
UUCP:   [uunet|ucbvax|decvax|hplabs]!tektronix!tekgvs!larryh
ARPA:   larryh%tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM@RELAY.CS.NET
CSNet:  larryh@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / D Collier-Brown /  Re: Commentary on Usefullness of Networks
     
Originally-From: dave@lethe.UUCP (Dave Collier-Brown)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Commentary on Usefullness of Networks
Date: 14 Apr 89 00:02:58 GMT
Organization: Systems Software

In article <734@nsscb.UUCP> det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow) writes:
>However most answers involve more than one component. Tabulate the
>components and take everything with-in the first standard deviation,
>and odds are you will at least be working in the right direction.
>
>Ideas trigger ideas.
 
  A delphic system works similarly, but in a more structured manner to
allow them to work with as few as a dozen participants.  Both variants
(thousands and dozens) do surprisingly well.
 
--dave
--
David Collier-Brown,  | {toronto area...}lethe!dave
72 Abitibi Ave.,      |  Joyce C-B:
Willowdale, Ontario,  |     He's so smart he's dumb.
CANADA. 223-8968      |
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Ethan Vishniac /  Re: Confirmations and the high-T-superconductivity precedent
     
Originally-From: ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Confirmations and the high-T-superconductivity precedent
Date: 14 Apr 89 21:01:11 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <24173@beta.lanl.gov>, mwj@beta.lanl.gov (William Johnson) writes:
> In article <11996@ut-emx.UUCP>, ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac) writes:
> [a good, thoughtful article on what it means to be a "top-notch" place;
> but what really caught my eye was ...]
Thank you Bill.
 
> An interesting matter of historical perspective is raised by this.  Can anyone
> remember how the "confirmations" of high-Tc superconductivity spread through
> the physics community?
 
> One of the real key features of that work was that *anyone* could verify it
> within just a couple of weeks of its announcement.  This extremely high
> reproducibility is not being observed with F&P, even though some potent --
> and hungry, Ethan -- teams are working on it.  (As an aside, let it be noted
> that one form of hunger is hunger for publicity.)  If someone who followed
> the superconductivity work more closely than I did would summarize its
> "confirmation" for the net, I would be grateful, and I suspect that some
> other people would too.  The analogy to F&P is meaningful -- and disturbing.
 
Indeed, I suspect that most `hunger' is hunger for publicity in some sense.
It has its good aspects, and also its bad ones (as you are so gently reminding
us).
 
The thing about the high Tc superconductors that I remember most vividly
was that shortly after the wave of announcements from such places as
Zurich, U of Houston, and Alabama were the wild rumors about room
temperature superconductivity.  I remember Fort Wayne, Indiana as figuring
into it.  The main point was that people were announcing peculiar
fluctuations in resistivity as though it were the onset of superconductivity.
After a brief time it seemed that it was no longer enough to confirm
earlier work.  The new results had to be spectacularly better.
 
The frenzy of announcements died off quite gradually.
 
In this case it's not yet clear the parallel should be to that development
or to polywater (which was also confirmed, if memory serves).
 
One thing that seems novel to me about this is the scientific politics
involved.  Many people on the sidelines are happy to view this
as chemistry vs. physics, big science (Tokomaks) vs. little science, elite
universities vs. state universities....etc. etc.  I don't remember
this as playing such a big role in the superconductivity stuff.
Possibly it's because the doubts over high Tc superconductivity didn't linger
as long or as painfully.
--
 I'm not afraid of dying     Ethan Vishniac, Dept of Astronomy, Univ. of Texas
 I just don't want to be     {charm,ut-sally,ut-emx,noao}!utastro!ethan
 there when it happens.      (arpanet) ethan@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU
    - Woody Allen            (bitnet) ethan%astro.as.utexas.edu@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
 
These must be my opinions.  Who else would bother?
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / C Browne /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: cbbrowne@lion.waterloo.edu (Christopher Browne)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 15 Apr 89 02:10:39 GMT
Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario

In article <1989Apr14.163448.28894@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
>problem:  the big bomb spends a lot of its energy very thoroughly
>smashing and incinerating the area directly underneath.  Unless there
>is some circumstance which makes it easier to get one or two big bombs
>in place (e.g. a sneak attack using a commercial airliner), the smaller
>bombs are always more cost-effective.  Big bombs are simply too big a
>concentration of energy to be useful.
 
Yup.  Think "Inverse Cube Law".  Energy is emitted in all directions (in
three dimensions).  Thus, when you multiply the blast power by 8, the radius
of destruction only doubles.  Thus, a 6.4 Megaton bomb would only affect a
region 4 times as wide as a (:-)) piddly little 100 kiloton bomb (not much
different than the Hiroshima one...).
 
                                 Christopher Browne
                                 University of Waterloo Computer Science Club
                                 Treasurer
                                 cbbrowne@lion
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / Bob Lewandowski /  Re: "Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion"  {Why NOT ??}
     
Originally-From: blew@tc.fluke.COM (Bob Lewandowski)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: "Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion"  {Why NOT ??}
Date: 15 Apr 89 06:01:25 GMT
Organization: John Fluke Mfg. Co., Inc., Everett, WA

In article <24162@beta.lanl.gov> mwj@beta.lanl.gov (William Johnson) writes:
>In article <1569@blake.acs.washington.edu>, jeffg@blake.acs.washington.
du (Jeffrey D. Goldader) writes:
>> Two physics grad students here at the University of Washington have
>> detected signs of tritium possibly produced by a cold fusion reaction.
>Jeff, the following is in no way an attack on you, the two students or the
>University of Washington ... but a pattern is appearing here that disturbs me.
 
I concur that there may be a pattern, but I'm not sure the pattern that I
observe is the same as the one the author comments on.
 
>First, a word about this experiment. ....
 
{Comments deleted about possible sources of error in the U of Washington
 experiment. The observations appear very well taken.}
 
>Now the disturbing pattern is the following: there appears to be a strong
>ANTIcorrelation between the willingness of a given institution to announce
>positive results in confirming F&P, and the "professionalism" with which that
>institution can attack the problem, ....     ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> {More comments deleted.}
>Consider, please, the list of eminent laboratories that have NOT confirmed
>F&P.  Los Alamos, Oak Ridge, Argonne, Livermore, Berkeley, Harvard, MIT,
>Stanford, Brookhaven (they have retracted their claim of confirmation, I
>believe), Bell Labs, CERN ... the list goes on and on.
 
Yes, I have considered your list, and now I believe I see a pattern emerging!
 
>                                                        These institutions
>have more in common than good reputations:
 
Yes, they all are representative of the 'established' "professional" group
who have collectively spent US$ n*10E9 (Where n is a large number!) over the
last 20 or 30+ years following the current line of fusion research.
 
>                    So why is it that we are now seeing articles that
>start "In a press conference today, grad students at the University of X
>reported [possible] experimental confirmation of cold fusion", and no such
>announcement from these other places?
 
A very good question!!  I'm sure that again the author doesn't agree with my
observations. I'm not a physicist, a chemist, or for that matter a scientist
of any sort, just a lowly engineer. However, after 25 years in the field, the
aroma of NIH associated with physics/chemistry seems to have the same smell
as it does in engineering!
 
>Again, I am certainly not attacking the U of W; ....
 
Nor is it my intent to attack the labs mentioned above.
 
I am not a graduate of, or affiliated with, the U of U, BYU, Texas A&M, or
the U of W.  As a result I don't feel that my 'ox' is being gored!
 
I am, however, a taxpayer of the State of Washington and the US of A, and
as an insignificant supplier of funds to many or all of the labs mentioned
above I feel that I have a monetary interest in the future of fusion
research. The objective being to try to get the highest yield for my dollar,
be it in a confined plasma in a Tokamak, a pellet being blasted by lasers,
or in a beaker on a bench top.
 
>               .... But I still wonder why some of the real scientific Big Guns
>aren't getting the same kind or results, or at least generating the same
>kind of press, as are random groups of graduate students.
 
Indeed!!
 
The fact the the aforementioned labs haven't/can't/won't observe(d)/report(ed)
positive results doesn't lead me to the conclusion that the F&P observations
can't be verified.
 
>--
>"One thing they don't tell you about doing	| Bill Johnson
>experimental physics is that sometimes you	| Los Alamos Nat'l Laboratory
>must work under adverse conditions ... like	| {!cmcl2!lanl!mwj}
>a state of sheer terror." (W. K. Hartmann)	| (mwj@lanl.gov)
 
If one didn't know better, one might almost say that there was a note of
'elitism' in the author's comments.
 
Is it possible that I missed a smiley face somewhere in the article ?
 
You guys have had, and are still having your turn, let someone else take a
shot at it!
 
---
--
            Bob Lewandowski
    Domain: blew@tc.fluke.COM
     Voice: (206) 347-6100, Ext. 5368
      UUCP: {microsof,sun}!fluke!blew
  U S nail: John Fluke Mfg. Co. / P.O. Box C9090 / MS 273G / Everett WA  98206
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / Michael McClary /  Re: A&M Experiment (was Re: Fusion newgroup proposal)
     
Originally-From: michael@xanadu.COM (Michael McClary)
Newsgroups: misc.headlines,sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: A&M Experiment (was Re: Fusion newgroup proposal)
Date: 15 Apr 89 11:06:48 GMT
Organization: Xanadu Operating Company, Palo Alto, CA

In article <4144@druhi.att.com> neal@druhi.ATT.COM (Neal D. McBurnett) writes:
>
> []  Not many people
>will spend over $150 for a troy oz. of palladium in order to generate
>an ever-lasting net output of 54 watts....
 
*I* would.  54 watts would be about right for a laptop, and a perpetual
power supply at $200ish sounds good to me.  (Of course you'd have to do
something about those last few neutrons before I'd park it in MY lap...)
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / Michael McClary /  Re: Deja Vu
     
Originally-From: michael@xanadu.COM (Michael McClary)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Deja Vu
Date: 15 Apr 89 11:34:51 GMT
Organization: Xanadu Operating Company, Palo Alto, CA

In article <16953@cos.com> smith@cos.UUCP (Steve Smith) writes:
>In article <22565@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> bks@alfa.berkeley.edu (Brad Sherman) writes:
>|Didn't the "Skylark" series of novels by (Chemist) "Doc" E.E. Smith,
>|go sort of like this: Scientist puts wire in chemical bath, applies
>|current, wire flies through wall, interstellar travel?
>
>Perhaps closer than you might think.  It depended on a funny nuclear
>physics experiment going on next door ....
 
It also depended on this X element found as an impurity in a deposit
of platinum...
 
(Do I hear the theme from the twilight zone?)
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / Michael McClary /  Re: Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion
     
Originally-From: michael@xanadu.COM (Michael McClary)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion
Date: 15 Apr 89 11:47:31 GMT
Organization: Xanadu Operating Company, Palo Alto, CA

In article <24162@beta.lanl.gov> mwj@beta.lanl.gov (William Johnson) writes:
>
>Now the disturbing pattern is the following: there appears to be a strong
>ANTIcorrelation between the willingness of a given institution to announce
>positive results in confirming F&P, and the "professionalism" with which that
>institution can attack the problem, based on their available resources and
>known expertise in both electrochemistry and nuclear physics.
>
>Consider, please, the list of eminent laboratories that have NOT confirmed
>F&P.  Los Alamos, Oak Ridge, Argonne, Livermore, Berkeley, Harvard, MIT,
>Stanford, Brookhaven (they have retracted their claim of confirmation, I
>believe), Bell Labs, CERN ... the list goes on and on.  These institutions
>have more in common than good reputations: they also have cadres of
>"professional" physicists who can bring a LOT of years' expertise to bear
>on the experiments, coupled with (I don't approve of this, but it's true)
>considerably more potent experimental apparatus than even most major
>universities have.  So why is it that we are now seeing articles that
>start "In a press conference today, grad students at the University of X
>reported [possible] experimental confirmation of cold fusion", and no such
>announcement from these other places?
 
Two explanations immediately spring to mind:
 
 - Their experts have an existing reputation to protect, so even if
   they get results, they're going to be darn careful to test them
   before risking it on an announcement that will make them also-
   rans if it's true, and idiots if it wasn't fusion after all.
 
 - They also have considerable investment in big-physics facilities,
   much of it funded by government agencies hoping for fusion power
   breakthroughs as the payoff.  Again, why rush to publish?
 
Therefore no data remains no data, and this pattern of silence doesn't
mean anything either way.
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / A Annala /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: annala@neuro.usc.edu (A J Annala)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 15 Apr 89 05:59:06 GMT
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA

>In article <6951@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney) writes:
>> [ subnuclear reactions? ]
>>This opens a terrifying prospect of a new generation of weapons with
>>potential explosive yields in the gigaton range, or even higher...
>
>In article <1989Apr11.170517.2780@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry
>Spencer) writes:
>>No, actually it doesn't.  They aren't particularly *useful*.  It would
>>not be difficult to build a hydrogen bomb with gigaton-plus yield;
>>there is no fundamental limit on the size of an H-bomb.  Nobody has
>>bothered, for the same reason that nobody actually builds 100-megaton
>>bombs:  a really big nuclear bomb spends much of its energy "making
>>the rubble bounce" near ground zero.
 
As I recall, several of the more concerned scientists at the initial
H-bomb tests were concerned that a bomb with a few megaton yield could
 
      (1)  blow the top out of the atmosphere ... alowing the entire
           environment to escape into space;
 
      (2)  crack the crust ... with similar catastrophic results; or
 
      (3)  set the atmosphere on fire ... again not a desirable result.
 
Perhaps someone in our military or civilian government sectors thought
it might be a bad idea to build devices in the 100+ megaton yield range.
 
AJ Annala
 
p.s. There was a time (before MIRV) that russian missiles were said to
     carry warheads in the 60-100 megaton yield range.  But, that was
     only a rumour.
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / David Bell /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: dbell@cup.portal.com (David J Bell)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 19:48:18 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)

>/ The article mentions "gravitational redshift" of photons.  Now: What happens
>/ if you have a very heavy object and you send a beam of photons straight up?
>/ At some point, they will stop.  Will they stick around and start to fall back
>/ as photons, gaining energy on the way?
>
>You have neatly described a black hole. (And they won't get as far as the event
>horizon, so you can't actually watch this happen.) For any lesser object, the
>photons are moving at greater than escape velocity and will not fall back.
>
>Actually, I'm not sure if the photons fall back or just silently vanish. (or
>some less visualizable event.) As I said, there's no way to go look.
>
>Strike that -- there's no way to go, look, and report back. :-)
>
>--Z
 
 
Don't be too sure of that discussion about not being able to know what
goes on *inside* the event horizon. As I understand it, should the
astronomers/cosmologists ever settle the question of the quantity of
dark matter in the universe, and should that quantity be enought to
"close" the universe we know, then we are actually *living inside* the
biggest known black hole! After all, if the universe *will* reverse its
expansion, and eventually re-collapse ("Big Crunch"), then E-M radiation
will also be included in the collapse ==> light cannot escape our
universe ==> the escape velocity is greater than C ==> this universe
is a blck hole...
 
Dave    dbell@cup.portal.com
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Tom Spuhler /  Re: A&M Experiment (was Re: Fusion newgroup proposal)
     
Originally-From: spuhler@hpcupt1.HP.COM (Tom Spuhler)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: A&M Experiment (was Re: Fusion newgroup proposal)
Date: 14 Apr 89 17:58:48 GMT
Organization: Systems Performance Lab

# either way here), then the capital costs of palladium are currently the
# biggest problem - the cost of the fuel is negligable.  Not many people
# will spend over $150 for a troy oz. of palladium in order to generate
# an ever-lasting net output of 54 watts....  Of course, other metals
 
Doesn't sound too bad to me.  doing the BOE (Back of envelope)
calculation the $150 price the 54 watts and the aproximate cost (around
here, PG&E is no bargain) of $.12/kw, it would pay for itself in 32
months.  Probably 36 given the extra bits, maybe a bit more given the
cost of money.  Now, this is based on my home costs, but still....
I also figured out my average consumption rate and it is about
0.232kw/hr, which means that 5 of the above could handle it, in theory,
assuming peak assists or redistribution or somesuch, etc.  Would it be
worth $750 to be have substantial independence from PG&E?  Certainly has
a nice sound to it.
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Steven E /  Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
     
Originally-From: stever@videovax.tv.Tek.com (Steven E. Rice, P.E.)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: E = m * (c ^ 2) and fusion
Date: 14 Apr 89 18:02:48 GMT
Organization: Tektronix TV Measurement Systems, Beaverton OR

In article <9203@watcgl.waterloo.edu>, Jim W Lai (jwtlai@watcgl.waterloo.edu)
writes:
 
> In article <6722@bsu-cs.bsu.edu> dhesi@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Rahul Dhesi) writes:
>> Er, no.  Mass disappears from the system as photons leave it.  If the
>> system were perfectly insulated against all radiation and particle
>> leakage, its mass could not change.
>> Photons have mass.
>
> From what I understand, photons are massless.  E = m c^2 only for
> massed particles at rest.  The energy for a photon is: E = p c, where p
> is momentum.  Mass is not conserved, only energy.
 
The answer to this question has been provided (in part) by Ralph L. Place
(rlp@bsu-cs.bsu.edu), in article <6735@bsu-cs.bsu.edu>:
 
P> The photon has zero 'rest mass' but has an equivalent relativistic
P> mass given by m = h/(c*lambda) where h is Planck's constant, c is
P> the speed of light in vacuum, and lambda is the photon wavelength.
P> Having zero rest mass enables it to travel at the speed of light
P> (what else?).
P> Note: the photon momentum is mc=h/lambda, making the connection
P> with the deBroglie wavelength formula in quantum mechanics...
 
Dusting off _Physics_ (Combined Edition), by David Halliday and Robert
Resnick (1966), brings back memories of 8:00 AM Physics classes.  It also
provides the equation for relativistic mass (p. 171):
 
 
                      m(zero)                    m(zero) = rest mass
         m  =  ---------------------     where   v = particle velocity
                sqrt(1 - v^2 / c^2)              c = speed of light
 
 
If a particle is moving at exactly the speed of light, the denominator is
zero.  Thus, for the relativistic mass to be other than infinity, the
numerator (the rest mass) must also be zero.
 
One prediction of Albert Einstein's Theory of General Relativity was
that the paths of photons would be deflected by a gravitational field,
precisely because they do have (relativistic) mass.  This prediction was
confirmed during an eclipse (1929, if I recall correctly).  The eclipse
of the sun allowed viewing faint objects very close to the sun's
position.  A star which should have been obscured by the sun was
visible because of bending of the photon paths by the gravitational
pull of the sun:
 
 
 
       Earth   .   .   .   .   .   .  Apparent position
                       S   .
                       U       .
                       N           .  Actual position
 
 
 
Of course, the distances are not to scale, and the angle is much
exaggerated.  The effect is quite real and has been repeatedly
confirmed.  I believe this was the first real confirmation of
Einstein's Theory of Relativity.
 
Yes, photons do have mass. . .
 
					Steve Rice
 
 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
* Every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord! *
new: stever@videovax.tv.Tek.com               [phone (503) 627-1320]
old: {decvax | hplabs | uunet | uw-beaver}!tektronix!videovax!stever
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Steven E /  Montana appreciates your assistance (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
     
Originally-From: stever@videovax.tv.Tek.com (Steven E. Rice, P.E.)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Montana appreciates your assistance (was Re: Reactions to Fusion)
Date: 14 Apr 89 17:09:45 GMT
Organization: Tektronix TV Measurement Systems, Beaverton OR

In article <2362@van-bc.UUCP>, Stuart Lynne (sl@van-bc.UUCP) writes:
 
> In article <1989Apr10.202118.7831@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry
> Spencer) writes:
>} In article <11789@ut-emx.UUCP> ethan@ut-emx.UUCP (Ethan Tecumseh Vishniac)
>} writes:
>}> But the real killer is that the only North American source of any size
>}> is in *Canada*!  Next thing you know they'll be asking us to accept
>}> that funny-looking money of theirs. :-)
>
>} Nah, we'll take that drab green stuff of yours, in adequate quantities of
>} course.  Special just for you, palladium at only $1000/ounce.
>
> Henry, you missed the sales meeting. $1000/ounce is the price for
> members of the Commonwealth. The US or Nato price is $1100/ounce.
 
Boy, things are really going to be booming in the Stillwater Mountains
of Montana!  Some development of platinum-group mines was going on, but
a price of $1,000 to $1,100/ounce for palladium will certainly speed things
up.  (Dramatically alters the economics of mining. . .)  Those of us that
hail from Montana particularly appreciate our Canadian friends' efforts to
improve Montana's economy and their willingness to give Montana palladium
most of the world market.
 
(Those of you who have heard of Montana's state slogan probably recall it
as "The Big Sky Country."  It wasn't too many years ago that Montana
license plates proudly proclaimed "The Treasure State".  Thanks to Pons
and Fleischman, that slogan may well return.)
 
					Steve Rice
 
 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
* Every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord! *
new: stever@videovax.tv.Tek.com               [phone (503) 627-1320]
old: {decvax | hplabs | uunet | uw-beaver}!tektronix!videovax!stever
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------------------------------
1989.04.13 / Dennis Thurlow /  Re: Cold fusion with normal water
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion with normal water
Date: 13 Apr 89 15:12:01 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC  S. Plainfield, NJ

In article <38613@bbn.COM> syswerda@bbn.com (Gilbert Syswerda) writes:
>Richard Harris reported on NPR this morning that Stanly Pons stated at an
>American Chemical Society meeting yesterday that he has been trying the
>cold fusion experiment with normal water during the last several weeks, and
>produced a reaction similar to, although not as strong as, that produced
>when using heavy water. Virtually no details were given. Harris also
>reported that Pons said that the normal water experiments were not very
>interesting.
 
I'm still going to bet that if the the ratio of H2O to D2O in the
"soup" were higher, P&F would have seen results sooner. The reaction
isn't going to start (with low current densities) until enough H+ has
diffused its way into the center of the cathod to "seed" the D+D
reaction. At high current densities, the speed of "diffusion" is a result of
electrostatic forces and H and D build up in the center at about the same
rate, so that isn't the way to get the reaction started faster.
-nsscb!det
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------------------------------
1989.04.14 / Dennis Thurlow /  Why the little schools?
     
Originally-From: det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Why the little schools?
Date: 14 Apr 89 20:18:25 GMT
Organization: AT&T NSSC  S. Plainfield, NJ

>I'm not going to continue with my speculations about why Texas A&M and
>Georgia Tech have gotten more press over cold fusion than MIT (and for
>that matter Los Alamos and Livermore).  I find it strange.  If other
>people think this is perfectly natural, I would like to hear an
>informed opinion on why exactly it is no surprise.
 
Because they are on top, and have been for 30 years (you say)! It
means thay have their reputation at stake. It means they've had time to
become highly bureaucratic and conservative. The vast majority of
major discoveries, inventions, and ideas have always come from the
amateurs and outsiders (no, I'm not going to cite examples, read
your history books). Anyone who has attended both a small college
and a major university can tell you how relitively inaccessable the
people with clout seem to be at universities. How long would it take
a berkeley grad student to get the funds and permission to try one
of these experiments?
 
By the way. If you did want too, this ad appeared in the Wall Street
Journal today:
 
                         99.9%
                         D  O
                          2
                          for
                 NUCLEAR FUSION STUDIES
                     [omitted hype]
                     1-800-448-9760
                       ISOTEC inc.
         3858 Benner Road, Miamisburg, Ohio 45342
         Fax: 513-859-4878          Tlx: 288-278
-nsscb!det
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / Tim Maroney /  Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
     
Originally-From: tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold fusion as a weapon?
Date: 15 Apr 89 18:21:27 GMT
Organization: Eclectic Software, San Francisco

In article <1989Apr14.163448.28894@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry
Spencer) writes:
>Doing it with a scattering of smaller bombs is cheaper, however.  Same
>problem:  the big bomb spends a lot of its energy very thoroughly
>smashing and incinerating the area directly underneath.  Unless there
>is some circumstance which makes it easier to get one or two big bombs
>in place (e.g. a sneak attack using a commercial airliner), the smaller
>bombs are always more cost-effective.  Big bombs are simply too big a
>concentration of energy to be useful.
 
Henry, you could make exactly the same argument with respect to nuclear
bombs.  Lots of chemical explosives distributed in a scatter pattern
could theoretically waste the same area just as effectively as a
nuclear explosion, with a smaller total yield.  Just as there's no
theoretical limit to the size of a nuclear explosion, there are none to
chemical explosions.
 
However, compactness does have a significant military advantage -- the
weapon is cheaper to deliver.  No one wants to put a few thousand tons
of TNT on souped-up Energia boosters when a single tactical nuclear
warhead can do the same job using a truck-mounted launcher.  A warhead
employing a hypothetical hadron reaction (which may or may not have
been discovered by Fleischmann and Pons) would have similar advantages
in portability and in efficient delivery.  Let's say the new warheads
cost ten times as much per unit yield than nuclear bombs.  It's still
cheaper, because the delivery systems are so much less expensive per
unit yield.
 
(Good thing I proofread my messages -- that came out as "a hypothetical
hardon reaction", and I forgot to crosspost to alt.sex.bondage.)
 
And still, no one has explained why accelerated neutron decay would
require "new physics".  In my humble opinion as a reader of quality
popularizations (e.g., Heinz Pagels, Scientific American), anyone who
thinks we know enough about the internal structure of nucleons to rule
out such a possibility is talking through their hat.
--
Tim Maroney, Consultant, Eclectic Software, sun!hoptoad!tim
 "Those Mayas were sacrificing not only pagan children, but baptized
 Christian children, for crying out loud!  And they were carrying out
 those sacrifices, those barbarities, with great savagery, without
 giving the victims the benefit of the humane types of death that the
 European Church accorded even to heretics and witches during that
 century, such as burning at the stake."
		-- Matthew Rosenblatt, rec.arts.books
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / Tim Maroney /  Re: Submission for Alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Submission for Alt.fusion
Date: 15 Apr 89 18:30:28 GMT
Organization: Eclectic Software, San Francisco

I wrote:
> No, they're not stupid questions.  Modern physics answers them by using
> a very counter-intuitive principle realized by Einstein.  The speed of
> light is the same regardless of your frame of reference.
 
In article <8904141136.AA11845@crdos1.UUCP> uunet!crdos1!davidsen writes:
>  I assume that you know what you're talking about, but you are putting
>it rather badly. It would be easy to assume from the above that there
>would not be a notable effect from the velocity.
>  When moving at a fractional light speed relative to an
>electromagnetic source the doppler effect shifts the frequency of the
>light.
 
Of course I'm familiar with Doppler shifts.  I read Einstein's popular
book on relativity when I was nine or ten years old.  This happened to
be totally irrelevant to the questions being asked, and so I omitted
it.  I don't think this is putting things badly; quite the opposite.
Omission of irrelevant details is very important to effective
exposition (as is avoiding alliterative abuses).
--
Tim Maroney, Consultant, Eclectic Software, sun!hoptoad!tim
"When errors are found in old research, the relevant theories are
 re-examined.  When facts contradict theory, theory gets dumped.  Is
 that why the NLP people are unwilling to research their facts?"
	-- Jerry Hollombe on sci.psychology
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / Ed Nather /  Re: Confirmations and the high-T-superconductivity precedent
     
Originally-From: nather@ut-emx.UUCP (Ed Nather)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Confirmations and the high-T-superconductivity precedent
Date: 15 Apr 89 15:28:42 GMT
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas

In article <19HWz497Wz10100O5Sg@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com>, sbf10@uts.amdahl
com (Samuel Fuller) writes:
>
> To this interested bystander, the previous work on high-T superconductors
> and the current work on low-T fusion have one important aspect in common.
> That is that they both take a very different approach at solving the
> problem, be it fusion or superconductivity, than that of the conventional
> researcher.  In so doing, they prove that there is more than one way to
> skin a cat.
 
Indeed.  When I was a kid, I got hold of a book called "Rockets into Outer
Space" that described theoretical work by Oberth and others regarding the
feasibility of space flight.  I rushed enthusiastically to my science
teacher with it, who squashed me with the comment
 
"Oh, come on.  There isn't a single fuel known to man that can lift its
own weight out of the earth's gravity, let alone carry other things."
 
That argument seemed devastating to me.  It's still true, by the way.
 
So how do we send rockets into outer space, then?
 
(The answer is left as an exercise for the reader.  It's easier to figure
out now than it was then -- but only because we know it *can* be done).
 
 
--
Ed Nather
Astronomy Dept, U of Texas @ Austin
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / Matthew Kennel /  Re: A&M Experiment (was Re: Fusion newgroup proposal)
     
Originally-From: mbkennel@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Matthew B. Kennel)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: A&M Experiment (was Re: Fusion newgroup proposal)
Date: 15 Apr 89 19:24:11 GMT
Organization: Princeton University, NJ

In article <-287879999@hpcupt1.HP.COM) spuhler@hpcupt1.HP.COM (Tom Spuhler) writes:
)# either way here), then the capital costs of palladium are currently the
)# biggest problem - the cost of the fuel is negligable.  Not many people
)# will spend over $150 for a troy oz. of palladium in order to generate
)# an ever-lasting net output of 54 watts....  Of course, other metals
)
)Doesn't sound too bad to me.  doing the BOE (Back of envelope)
)calculation the $150 price the 54 watts and the aproximate cost (around
)here, PG&E is no bargain) of $.12/kw, it would pay for itself in 32
)months.  Probably 36 given the extra bits, maybe a bit more given the
)cost of money.
 
Wait...54 watts of HEAT is much less useful than 54 watts of wall-socket
power.  You have to get the temperature way up to get any reasonable
efficiency.
 
 
matt kennel
mbkennel@phoenix.princeton.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / Doug Manatt /  Re: Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion
     
Originally-From: manatt@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV (Doug Manatt)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion
Date: 15 Apr 89 21:10:15 GMT
Organization: LLNL, Nuclear Chemistry Division, Livermore  CA

In article <24162@beta.lanl.gov> mwj@beta.lanl.gov (William Johnson) writes:
>
>Now the disturbing pattern is the following: there appears to be a strong
>ANTIcorrelation between the willingness of a given institution to announce
>positive results in confirming F&P, and the "professionalism" with which that
>institution can attack the problem, based on their available resources and
>known expertise in both electrochemistry and nuclear physics.
>
>Consider, please, the list of eminent laboratories that have NOT confirmed
>F&P.  Los Alamos, Oak Ridge, Argonne, Livermore, Berkeley, Harvard, MIT,
>Stanford, Brookhaven (they have retracted their claim of confirmation, I
>believe), Bell Labs, CERN ... the list goes on and on.
 
Regarding caution or hesitance in announcements by "eminent" laboratories.
The following is a quote from a member of our Nuclear Structure group.
 
     "In science, you must either be first, or you must be right."
 
 
                         Doug Manatt
                         Nuclear Chemistry
                         manatt@lll-winken.llnl.gov
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------------------------------
1989.04.15 / David Cannon /  Re: Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion
     
Originally-From: dmc@Portia.Stanford.EDU (David M. Cannon)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Places that *don't* confirm cold fusion
Date: 15 Apr 89 17:50:53 GMT
Organization: Stanford University

 
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
 
We have decided to publish the results of recent Stanford University
experiments on cold nuclear fusion over this newsgroup because it has proven to
be the medium of choice for quickly disseminating reliable scientific
information.
 
Dateline: April 14, 1989
STANFORD UNIVERSITY
 
Stanford University experimenters have rushed to repeat the history-making
experiments of Drs. Fleishmann and Pons', and Jones and Rafelski et al, which
they have taken as evidence of cold nuclear fusion.  We have met with the same
success as that of many other nationally recognized laboratories, and have
developed a theory to explain our results.  We hypothesize that a new family of
fusion pathways is responsible for the mixed results that researchers around
the country have obtained thus far; the pathway includes a factor which we are
certain has not yet been controlled for in any experiment.  An example from the
family of reactions we hypothesize:
 
                (2)H + (2)H  + $+ --> (4)He + misc.
 
In order to understand the mechanics of this reaction, one must understand the
physics of the common $ particle, the properties of which have been hitherto
unreported in the nuclear literature.  The particle was first roughly described
by the eminent 18th century physicist Adam Smith, whose theories regarding it
are still held in high esteem.  (An alternative theory was also proposed by one
Karl Marx a century later, who called the particle alternately 'product of
labor' and 'surplus value'.)  Today it is known as the 'cashflowon' and is
known to pervade almost every corner of our universe in both positive and
negative varieties.  The $+ and $- are mutual anti-particles and when they
meet, they annihilate each other, often emitting a persistent, low-energy sense
of loss.
 
Our discovery that this particle is necessary for the reaction to take place
explains results already rumored from organizations such as Princeton,
Livermore, Sandia, etc. and also explains why Fleishmann and Pons'
privately-funded experiments have yielded the highest energies.  Money from
Washington has become so diluted by $- particles from deficit spending, that
reactions in experiments conducted using these funds will inevitably be
poisoned; many laboratories around the country are saturated and may be unable
to successfully observe cold fusion for years to come.  (Which laboratories?
The $- is, for all intents and purposes, a virtual and not a real particle, not
occurring in nature and being a property of funds that were created from
nothing.  Most U.S. government money is thus, in part, unreal; DOE and DOD
money is possibly the least real of all...) This discovery leads us also to
wonder what other scientific results may be suspect because of a failure to
control for the $ factor.
 
Further evidence for our hypothesis is being reported almost daily: Hungary's
experiment is almost certainly government funded, but the government of
Hungary's production of $- cannot rival Washington, the strongest source in the
observable universe; MIT has for years been known to be soaked to the gills
with $-, while graduate students at University of Washington, though they have
probably been exposed, haven't had enough time to absorb a dose which would be
lethal to the experiment.
 
We thus report our conclusion that a strong inverse correlation has been and
will continue to be observed between the amount of U.S. government support used
to conduct an experiment and the likelihood that confirmation of the Utah
experimenters' results will be recorded.  A patent on this conclusion has
already been filed.
 
We also suggest that in the future, experimental design should control for
another factor: the degree to which the laboratory conducting the experiment
resembles a corporation. The great respect that the Utah researchers are
accorded notwithstanding, results from MIT and other laboratories lead us to
suspect that administrative smugness (the force carried by the the !!-, or
'negative doublespeak', particle) and a licensing office full of lawyers
(which emit the hazardous |, or 'shafton', particle) may also skew the results
of any experiment.  To test for the corporateness of any organization, simply
take the name of the organization and tack an "Inc." on the end. (e.g.
"Stanford, Inc.")  If a lot of things that confused you before now suddenly
make sense, then you have a strong candidate.
 
                    (-:(-:(-:(-:(-:(-::-):-):-):-):-):-)
 
(To further test the $ hypothesis, my roommate and I assembled a glass, some
semi-valuable metal objects, a flashlight battery, and some water collected not
far from the physics lab here into the kitchen sink and made an enormous mess
with hardly any energy input at all.  We believe that if we can bathe the
apparatus in honest, hard work next time, we will be able to rule the world.)
 
Disclaimer: Everything you read in this posting is a lie.
 
Double disclaimer: This press release is intended to emit 'sardons'; depending
on your state of mind, you may be at risk from sardonic radiation.
 
David M. Cannon
Founder and spokesman
Center for Cold Fusion and Paranormal Phenomena
Stanford University
Stanford, CA
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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------------------------------
1989.04.16 / Fred Gilham /  Re: Confirmations and the high-T-superconductivity precedent
     
Originally-From: gilham@polya.Stanford.EDU (Fred Gilham)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Confirmations and the high-T-superconductivity precedent
Date: 16 Apr 89 01:17:05 GMT
Organization: Stanford University

In article <12070@ut-emx.UUCP> nather@ut-emx.UUCP (Ed Nather) writes:
>In article <19HWz497Wz10100O5Sg@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com>, sbf10@uts.amdah
.com (Samuel Fuller) writes:
>
>So how do we send rockets into outer space, then?
>
 
Multi-stage rockets, right?  We don't actually lift that much weight out of
the earth's gravity well.
-Fred Gilham
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------------------------------
1989.04.16 /  caulkins@cdp.U /  Re: D20 For Sale, Refining
     
Originally-From: caulkins@cdp.UUCP
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: D20 For Sale, Refining
Date: 16 Apr 89 03:41:00 GMT

 
$(Canadian)425  per Kg for heavy water is pretty pricey !
Assuming my arithmetic and financial data are accurate,  heavy
water works out to cost $(US)0.357 per gram, about 1.7 times
the price of silver.  Unless large scale production of heavy
water can lower the price, or unless the energy yield from the
P/F process is very large, it appears the oil companies are not
in for much competition.
 
My work in computer communications hardly qualifies me as a
chemical engineer.  Still, the heavy-chemicals part of the
process seems straightforward; pumping a bunch of water and gas
around at moderate pressure through a pair of heated reaction
towers, then distilling the enriched result.  Where does all
the expense come from ?
 
Dave C
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------------------------------
1989.04.16 / bass randale /  He's Still Breathing [was Re: He's dead Jim.]
     
Originally-From: crb7q@hudson.acc.virginia.edu (bass cameron randale)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: He's Still Breathing [was Re: He's dead Jim.]
Date: 16 Apr 89 13:57:20 GMT
Organization: University of Virginia, Charlottesville

In article <4737@pt.cs.cmu.edu> vac@sam.cs.cmu.edu (Vincent Cate) writes:
>
>The heavy water cell produces a little more heat than regular water.
>This is consistent with:
>
>    "The average value for absorption of deuterium being reported
>     as 8379 cal/mole compared with 9605 cal/mole for hydrogen."
>
>          From page 125 of "The Palladium Hydrogen System" by Lewis
>
>Since absorbing hydrogen/deuterium is endothermic the cell with hydrogen
>absorbs 9605 cal/mole and the deuterium cell absorbs 8379 cal/mole.  The
>net result is that the deuterium cell runs hotter.  I am assuming that
>both cells are able to hold more hydrogen/deuterium (they should not be
>full in 40 minutes).
>
 
I think that if you and I have copies of "The Palladium-Hydrogen System"
by Lewis, then Pons and Fleischmann also were probably able to get
copies.
 
I will not comment on the veracity of Mr. Coey's experiment
in Dublin.  He has obviously not performed careful calorimetry
in his experiments.  If you burn paper in the second flask, the
temperature will be higher than in the ordinary water flask.
I do not think that his experiments have any meaning in the context
of cold fusion.
 
>
>
>Did Fleischmann and Pons overlook this heat of absorption?  I did not see
>it mentioned in their paper.  If they thought they were at 100% during the
>charging period (refrigerator running) and then after the palladium was
>full of deuterium it got hotter (refrigerator stopped) they would think
>they were getting extra heat out.
>
 
This could only happen if they calibrated their
experiment during the charging period.  This is
highly unlikely from someone who had done calorimetry before.
 
I think that to suggest that two groups have performed
calorimetry incompetently is to suggest the improbable,
to say the least.
 
>If this is the case then the 8379 cal/mole is just right to explain the
>extra heat in their experiment.  They got 1.11 times as much energy out in
>the form of heat as they put in in electricity (11% extra).  It takes 68K
>cal/mole to electrolyze water.  If we put in 68K cal/mole electricity and
>get out 68+8K cal/mole of heat we would be getting out exactly 111% of what
>we put in.  The extra 8K is really due to zeroing the scale while the
>refrigerator was on.  The fact that the numbers work out exactly makes
>me think they did overlook this.
 
I think current numbers are in the 1000% to 1200% range for
total energy overproduction.  I assume that heat generation
has climbed with this.  More on this "refrigeration effect" later.
 
>Alt.fusion was fun while it lasted,
>
>     Vince  Cate
>     vac@cs.cmu.edu
 
It is not this simple.  Alt.fusion can continue.
 
>
>
>Below is a CMU post that I think describes what is going on:
>
>06-Apr-89 12:13    Andreas.Nowatzyk             Fusion update
>
>Claim 2. is far more interesting and controversial because it implies a net
>energy production at very significant levels (1W in --> 4W out).
>
>      [more calorimetry descriptions deleted]
>
>The message attached below describes a more mundane explanation:
>
>During the precharge time, D is diffusing into the Pd rod. This requires heat
>that is taken from the cell. This is similar to what happens if you dissolve
>NH4NO3 in water, the principle behind instant cold packs. If P&F neglected to
>account for this heat loss during the precharge period, their initial 100%
>thermal efficiency is really only 90% due to the built in refrigerator. Once
>the Pd rod is saturated with D, no further heat loss occurs and the thermal
>efficiency jumps up.
>
>This explanation fit most known results so far (and does not require any new
>magic):
>
>1. It depends on the volume of the Pd rod, as claimed by P&F
>
>2. Heat "production" persists for as long as you care to run the experiment.
>   The apparent energy production can be made large enough to rule out any
>   chemical process. Again in line with P&F's claims.
 
No.  Even assuming an undergraduate error on the part of
two well-respected scientists, the enthalpy increases
associated with the heat of adsorption are only available
upon desorption of the deuterium, and then only in finite quantities.
This "referigeration effect" can not continue in equilibrium
forever, the heat must come from somewhere.
 
A small calculation will suffice to show that this "refrigeration effect"
can not be happening, even with the postulated idiocy
of Pons/Fleischmann.
 
     Nearly 5 MJ are released during the production of heat.
                                      6
     Grab 10% as the excess = 0.5 x 10  J.
                             3
     Density of Pd = 12 gm/cm
                              3
     Electrode volume = 1.3 cm
 
     Thus electrode weight = 15.6 gm.
 
     Thus we have ~0.15 mol of Pd.
 
     Very generously assume 3 (three) deuterons per Pd (if this is the case
     then the case for fusion increases dramatically).
     We thus have 0.45 mol of D.
 
     The heat of adsorption is ~33,600 J/mol D.
 
Thus our "phantom heat" cannot appear to be more than
about 20,000 J or 0.02 MJ even under the most ridiculous assumptions
of deuterium absorption.  We do not see an apparent
0.5 MJ production even assuming complete incompetence on
the part of Pons/Fleischmann (note: they cannot be completely
incompetent, a graduate student is working with them to check
up on their errors).
 
A few calculations go a very long way towards recognition
that an extraordinary process is occurring here (either
electrochemical or fusion).
 
>This explanation predicts that P&F's experiment will still show "fusion" heat
>if the D2O is substituted with plain H2O.
 
More by your argument, significantly more.  Remember, calorimetry
is fairly well developed.  Any 1/8 increase in heat production
will be noticed.
 
>Article 7105 of sci.physics:
>From: ted@nmsu.edu (Ted Dunning)
>Subject: Re: Fusion Discovery Tentatively Confirmed
>
>  [arguments of the same nature by Mr. Dunning]
>
>
 
Once again, Pons and Fleischmann melted an electrode....
 
     ... A simple back of the envelope calculation shows
     that the exothermic reaction of the desorption of deuterium
     could not cause a high enough rate of heating to melt the
     cathode.
 
                            2                 2                2
     Heat of absorption of   H ~ 8000 cal/mol  H = 33600 J/mol  H
 
                                 3
     density of Pd  =~ 12 gm / cm
 
                                                        2
     specific heat of Pd-D system = C  = 33.6 J/deg mol  H
                                     p
                                                      3
     largest Pons and Fleischmann rod volume is 1.3 cm
                                                            2
     If we liberally assume that the Pd lattice soaks up 2   H
     per Pd then the largest rod ingests ~ 0.3 mol of deuterium.
 
     Also assume for grins that the rod starts at 400K.
                   2
     If all of the  H flees the lattice simultaneously, we can determine the
     change in temperature via
 
                  C  delta T = delta Q
                   p
 
                                        2            2
                  delta Q = 33600 J/mol  H * 0.3 mol  H = 10,800 J
 
 
      So
 
                 T - 400K = (1 / 33.6) * 10800
 
      or
 
                 T ~= 500 K
 
      Of course if we halved the specific heat we would get to 600K,
      which is still not enough to melt the Pd electrode.  Note that
      we have assumed instantaneous desorption which is not realistic
      even for Pd-H.  I think that we are going to have to be more creative
      than just lattice energy to explain this one....
 
      Yours repetitively ...
 
 
                                     dale bass
 
 
             crb7q@virginia.edu    or   crb7q@hudson.acc.edu
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------------------------------
1989.04.16 / William Johnson /  Re: Why the little schools?
     
Originally-From: mwj@beta.lanl.gov (William Johnson)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Why the little schools?
Date: 16 Apr 89 15:14:15 GMT
Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory

In article <748@nsscb.UUCP>, det@nsscb.UUCP (Dennis Erwin Thurlow) writes:
> >I'm not going to continue with my speculations about why Texas A&M and
> >Georgia Tech have gotten more press over cold fusion than MIT (and for
> >that matter Los Alamos and Livermore).  I find it strange.  If other
> >people think this is perfectly natural, I would like to hear an
> >informed opinion on why exactly it is no surprise.
>
> Because they are on top, and have been for 30 years (you say)! [...]
 
Gee, nice of you to say that ... :-)
 
> [...]  How long would it take
> a berkeley grad student to get the funds and permission to try one
> of these experiments?
 
Well, I can't speak for Berkeley or some of the other places, but it took
Los Alamos three *days* to start an experiment from the first announcement
by F&P.  This included getting the necessary "permission" (which could
better be described as "powerful encouragement"), rounding up apparatus,
and forming the appropriate collaborations, which don't involve grad
students as much as they do scientific professionals with from 10 to 30 years'
experience after their Ph.D.'s.
 
That hardly speaks of bureaucratic inertia and conservatism to me.
 
--
"One thing they don't tell you about doing	| Bill Johnson
experimental physics is that sometimes you	| Los Alamos Nat'l Laboratory
must work under adverse conditions ... like	| {!cmcl2!lanl!mwj}
a state of sheer terror." (W. K. Hartmann)	| (mwj@lanl.gov)
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------------------------------
1989.04.16 / Vincent Cate /  May he rest in peace.  :-)
     
Originally-From: vac@sam.cs.cmu.edu (Vincent Cate)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: May he rest in peace.  :-)
Date: 16 Apr 89 22:18:09 GMT
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI

 
>From: crb7q@hudson.acc.virginia.edu (bass cameron randale)
>Subject: He's Still Breathing [was Re: He's dead Jim.]
>
> .....
>
> I think current numbers are in the 1000% to 1200% range for
> total energy overproduction.  I assume that heat generation
> has climbed with this.  More on this "refrigeration effect" later.
 
   The higher numbers were calculated based on subtracting out some
of the energy that they put in.  For example, it seems reasonable to
subtract out the energy of electrolysis since you could get it
back using a fuel cell.  If there is an error of 11% of the original
energy you put in,  as you subtract off parts of the input energy you
will make this error percentage larger.
 
 
> A small calculation will suffice to show that this "refrigeration effect"
> can not be happening, even with the postulated idiocy
> of Pons/Fleischmann.
>
>      Nearly 5 MJ are released during the production of heat.
>                                       6
>      Grab 10% as the excess = 0.5 x 10  J.
 
    The 4 MJ in the paper comes from 10 watts for 120 hours and my
theory is that the 10 watts is not real.  If they made the postulated
mistake then it would look like there was more heat than there really
was.  If the 10 watts are not real then the 4MJ are not real and there
is no extraordinary process going on.
 
 
>Once again, Pons and Fleischmann melted an electrode....
>
>     ... A simple back of the envelope calculation shows
>     that the exothermic reaction of the desorption of deuterium
>     could not cause a high enough rate of heating to melt the
>     cathode.
>
>     ...
>
>                 T ~= 500 K
 
    As palladium gets hot it holds less deuterium.  As it releases
deuterium it releases heat.  It seems to me that under the right
conditions you could get an explosion.  Now maybe its not enough
energy to melt 12 grams of palladium but it would not surprise me if
it could make an explosion big enough to destroy the experiment.
In their paper, Fleischmann and Pons say that some of the palladium
was "vapourized" but later they admit that they were not there at
the time of the explosion and just could not find all of the palladium
after the explosion (not so hard to believe).
 
  -- Vince Cate
 
 
 
--
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------------------------------
1989.04.16 / Jan Genemans /  Re: Submission for Alt.fusion
     
Originally-From: genemans@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (Jan Genemans)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Re: Submission for Alt.fusion
Date: 16 Apr 89 23:52:01 GMT
Organization: U.S.M.M.A., Kings Point, NY

 
> The speed of
> light is the same regardless of your frame of reference.  If you fly
> towards a flashlight at half the speed of light, the light is still
> coming at you at about 300,000 km/sec.  If you run away from the
> flashlight, then the light is still coming at you at 300,000 km/sec.
> Photons' rest mass is an abstraction, because a photon can't ever be at
> rest, or even slow down the tiniest fraction.
 
The speed of light does not remain the same.  It travels 299,792.5 km/sec in
a vacuum and it 299,708 km/sec a difference of 84.5 km/sec.  It changes speed
as it travels through mediums of different densities just as sound or other
forms of wave propagation.
--
Jan K. Genemans, Consultant                   Jan.Genemans@Dartmouth.edu
Engineering Department
U. S. Merchant Marine Academy
Kings Point, NY  11024-1699                   "Live long and prosper." -Spock
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------------------------------
1989.04.16 / Cary Lewis /  Cold Fusion Growing Colder
     
Originally-From: cslewis@lily.waterloo.edu (Cary Lewis)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Cold Fusion Growing Colder
Date: 16 Apr 89 20:13:11 GMT
Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario

Well it appears ladies and gentlemen that the supporting evidence for
the F&P cold fusion technique is rather disappointing to say the least.
Even though it is still early in the ball game, the naysayers are ahead
by a whole bunch of runs, and it looks the umpires are definitely not
on our sides. I have very mixed emotions about all this, here I was
a fourth year student just finishing off my math/computer science degree
and thinking I was seeing the dawn of a new age.
 
Now not even a month later I am not so sure. True enough I don't know enough
about physics or chemistry to claim any scientific reason for feeling that this
is going to turn out be nothing, and yet I don't feel nearly as optomistic
about cold fusion even working (let alone being viable as an energy source)
as I did two days ago. One of the positive aspects of these recent events
is that people began to think about what it would be like to live in a world
where the cost the energy to do something was negligible.
 
There were all the stories of ending world hunder by irrigating deserts,
reports on how the poor nations of the world would suddenly be able to afford
giving their citizens an abundant source of energy. The thing that kills
me about all these positive stories is that it doesn't have to take
someone harnessing fusion to do all this. We spend a trillion dollars
a year on arms (conventional and nuclear). Twenty percent of that on
nuclear weapons, that by all rights can never be used; unless we really
want to turn our planet into a cinder, a lifeless hunk of rock.
 
I guess I'm trying to say is that if we live in a world where thousands of
computers can communicate around the world, and we have amazing discoveries
(even if they don't always pan out) we can make this hunk of rock we call
home quite nice for everyone who lives on it. I'm sure one day
fusion will become a reality (the experts say 20-50 years before hot fusion
can become realistic) I hope we don't have to wait that long before some
of our world problems finally are addressed.
 
As a sidebar, the prices of palladium have gone up quite a lot, and some
small Canadian mining stocks have more than doubled, I wonder how much
money has been made in the Univeristy community since all this started.
Anyone with any sense of economics would have to know that the markets would
go crazy with the speculation (by the way I missed my chance, you still
need money to make money in this world). Doubling your money in the course
of a week is a pretty good return rate.  I'm not suggesting anything by this
comment, but it does give us something to think about.
 
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"home is where the heart lies but if the heart lies where is home, it's
where the heart lies, but where is home?" - fish
cudkeys:
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1989.04.16 /  osmigo@ut-emx. /  Fusion-driven steam engines
     
Originally-From: osmigo@ut-emx.UUCP
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Fusion-driven steam engines
Date: 16 Apr 89 21:27:52 GMT
Organization: Speech Communication UT Austin

I've been discussing possible applications of fusion technology with some
friends, and one idea that has come up is using cold fusion devices as a
source of heat for steam engines.
 
The cold fusion device reportedly achieved a temperature of over 5000 degrees.
The major obstacle to steam power thus far has been an easily transportable
and quick-starting heat source. Could it be that we now have it?
 
Just for the record, the automobile known as the Stanley Steamer made the
world's speed record (over 100mph) back around 1915 or so.
 
The water used for the steam would be recycled, i.e., a closed system. This
would produce vehicles (cars, planes, boats, etc.) with literally unlimited
range, with a pollution level of zero.
 
The impact would be pervasive. Surface warfare technology would be
revolutionized. The economy would be heavily impacted, because of greatly
reduced costs for operating manufacturing machinery and shipping goods.
 
It would certainly be feasible for individuals to have small, steam-driven
power generators in their back yards, or even underground, practically
wiping out the power industry.
 
Comments?
 
Ron
 
 =+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+
 >  Ron Morgan    {ames, utah-cs, uunet, gatech}!cs.utexas.edu!ut-emx!osmigo  <
 >  Univ. of Texas  {harvard, pyramid, sequent}!cs.utexas.edu!ut-emx!osmigo   <
 >  Austin, Texas        osmigo@ut-emx.UUCP       osmigo@emx.utexas.edu       <
 =+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+
cudkeys:
cuddy16 cudenosmigo cudmo4 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1989 
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1989.04.17 / Donn Seeley /  atoms vs. basketballs
     
Originally-From: donn@wasatch.utah.edu (Donn Seeley)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: atoms vs. basketballs
Date: 17 Apr 89 02:01:52 GMT
Organization: University of Utah CS Dept

I found this in Newsweek (4/17/89) -- it's a quote from Chancellor
Msgr. John Petillo, explaining why Seton Hall University has worked
hard at developing a powerhouse sports program:
 
	A 17-year-old is not interested in whether or not a professor
	is fusing an atom...  What they want is something that gives
	them recognition and an identity.  A championship basketball
	team does that.
 
This helps explain why Dr Pons paid for his experiments from his own
funds, and for that matter why the University of Utah fired its
basketball coach Lynn Archibald at the end of last season.
 
Ideally we could generate energy from fusing basketballs,
 
Donn Seeley    University of Utah CS Dept    donn@cs.utah.edu
40 46' 6"N 111 50' 34"W    (801) 581-5668    utah-cs!donn
cudkeys:
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1989.04.17 / Tim Onders /  Dumb Question
     
Originally-From: brazil@uruguay.acm.rpi.edu (Tim Onders)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion
Subject: Dumb Question
Date: 17 Apr 89 02:52:41 GMT
Organization: South American Dictatorship

Why not test for fusion by running the cell for a long time and doing a
spectrum analysis on the products for helium?
 
Timothy Onders
brazil@uruguay.acm.rpi.edu
brazil@pawl.rpi.edu
brazil@rpitsmts.BITNET (Not Really)
brazil@somewhere
brazil
cudkeys:
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1989.04.16 / John Moore /  Refrigerator, not fusion? (was Re: He's dead Jim.)
     
Originally-From: john@anasaz.UUCP (John Moore)
Newsgroups: alt.fusion,sci.physics
Subject: Refrigerator, not fusion? (was Re: He's dead Jim.)
Date: 16 Apr 89 19:08:42 GMT
Organization: Anasazi Inc, Phoenix AZ

In article <4737@pt.cs.cmu.edu> vac@sam.cs.cmu.edu (Vincent Cate) writes:
]
]    "The average value for absorption of deuterium being reported
]     as 8379 cal/mole compared with 9605 cal/mole for hydrogen."
]
]          From page 125 of "The Palladium Hydrogen System" by Lewis
]
]Since absorbing hydrogen/deuterium is endothermic the cell with hydrogen
]absorbs 9605 cal/mole and the deuterium cell absorbs 8379 cal/mole.  The
]net result is that the deuterium cell runs hotter.  I am assuming that
]both cells are able to hold more hydrogen/deuterium (they should not be
]full in 40 minutes).
]
]
]
]Did Fleischmann and Pons overlook this heat of absorption?  I did not see
]it mentioned in their paper.  If they thought they were at 100% during the
]charging period (refrigerator running) and then after the palladium was
]full of deuterium it got hotter (refrigerator stopped) they would think
]they were getting extra heat out.
]
]If this is the case then the 8379 cal/mole is just right to explain the
]extra heat in their experiment.  They got 1.11 times as much energy out in
]the form of heat as they put in in electricity (11% extra).  It takes 68K
]cal/mole to electrolyze water.  If we put in 68K cal/mole electricity and
]get out 68+8K cal/mole of heat we would be getting out exactly 111% of what
]we put in.  The extra 8K is really due to zeroing the scale while the
]refrigerator was on.  The fact that the numbers work out exactly makes
]me think they did overlook this.
 
Well.. I don't think the numbers do work out. Let see...
 
F&P experiment reports: .4X10cm rod yields excess 26.8W of heat (this
result was scaled from the actual experiment using .4X1.25cm rod).
 
.4X10cm rod => 1.26cc. If Palladium absorbs 900 times its volume (from
CRC handbook),
 
Rod absorbs 1134cc which is .102 gm (H) or .204 gm (D2) [assuming equal
absorbtion]
 
This is .102 Mole (H) or .102 Mole (D).
 
This yields: Hydrogen: -980 cal = -1.11 W-hr = -3960 J
             Deuterium:-855 cal = -0.99 W-hr = -3576 J
 
The difference, which is what is important if we assume they did
their control calorimetry took place during the charge cycle, yields
an error of .101 W-hr or -363.6J.
 
If we assume they charged the cell in one half hour (unlikely - they said
it took weeks), we get an error of .202 Watts. They report an excess of
26.8 Watts, which is a heck of a difference. If we use their charge
time of two weeks, we get an effect due to absorption of only .0003 Watts.
They also report a total excess heat (after taking into account the
energy stored by electrolysis and then energy released by Joule heating)
of as much as 4 MJ over time. This is a lot more than 364J which is
the total, over time, that can be explained by the Palladium absorption.
 
A couple of more serious problems with this analysis:
 
(1) The F&P palladium was not purged of absorbed Hydrogen before the
    experiment started. Thus, most of the D charging would actually
    have been by exchange with H in the Palladium, which has minimal
    thermal consequences.
 
(2) They apparently calibrated the calorimeter (set the "zero" point)
    before turning on the apparatus, not during the charging cycle.
    Thus, the whole line of reasoning about Palladium absorption is wrong.
 
Of course I could be all wet on this, being an engineer & not a chemist.
--
John Moore (NJ7E)           mcdphx!anasaz!john asuvax!anasaz!john
(602) 861-7607 (day or eve) long palladium, short petroleum
The opinions expressed here are obviously not mine, so they must be
someone else's. :-)
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