A reporter asked me: "Who replicated cold fusion first?" Here is my answer, which people here might find amusing.
Most of the high quality academic scientific work on cold fusion was done in the 1990s. Most of the researchers are now dead. They were the crème de la crème of twentieth century electrochemists. People such as Bockris, who wrote the book on modern electrochemistry *; Yeager, for whom they named the institute after he died **; and Martin Fleischmann FRS. Most leading electrochemists tried the experiment, and they all succeeded. They tried it because they all knew Martin Fleischmann personally. Electrochemistry is a small world. People who were not electrochemists, and who did not include electrochemists in their research teams, failed to replicate. For example, 20 of the big-name particle physics labs and plasma fusion labs failed for that reason. In one case they confused the anode and the cathode. *** That precludes success -- to say the least. Expecting a plasma fusion researcher to succeed in cold fusion is like expecting an electrochemist to build a tokamak reactor. * "Modern Electrochemistry," Vols. 1 and 2. http://www.amazon.com/Modern-Electrochemistry-Ionics-2nd-Edition/dp/0306455552 ** Ernest B. Yeager Center for Electrochemical Sciences http://chemistry.case.edu/department/research/yces/ *** Other examples described on p. 11: http://lenr-canr.org/acrobat/RothwellJlessonsfro.pdf
