At 03:55 PM 3/24/2010, Jed Rothwell wrote:
Here is an interview with Peter at the ACS conference:
<http://io9.com/5499139/an-interview-with-peter-hagelstein>http://io9.com/5499139/an-interview-with-peter-hagelstein
This is linked in from:
<http://io9.com/5498099/cold-fusion--will-it-save-the-world-or-be-forgotten>http://io9.com/5498099/cold-fusion--will-it-save-the-world-or-be-forgotten
Some comments I have not heard before:
". . . It also tells us what to look for in a material as to what
makes it special, to make the cold fusion excess heat process work.
What we've found recently -- very recently -- is that bulk palladium
cannot host a 2D molecule, but if the palladium has a vacancy, it
lowers the electron density and 2D can form. And very recently we
found not only can it form, but there's a little cage that it has a
possibility of fitting in, if the loading is just right. If the
monovacancy has the right occupation and so forth. These conditions
under which the monovacancy can host the 2D molecule seem to very
consistent with the onset of the excess power in the experiments. So
that's exciting to us!
Holy moly! What have I been talking about, Jed? Prescence of the
molecular species in palladium! What does this do? If there is
substantial population of 2D molecules, then once in a blue moon you
might get a transient second molecule and, Takahashi's prediction, Pop!
Codeposition creates this very complex fractal surface, lots of
voids, very high surface area, in fact.
The same detailed calculation that found this effect in palladium
seems to show a lesser version of it in gold. One of my friends has
a result, where he thinks he might have seen some excess heat as a
preliminary result in a [gold coated cathode]. That's a result that
needs confirming, but if its confirmed, then maybe we're beginning
to get the ability to maybe do the computation of the material to
find out. . . ."
What if the effect with gold cathode/palladium codeposition is
actually taking place at the gold surface!
I guess this means Au-D. That would be a new approach. I have not
heard of any work with Au since Ohmori worked with Au-H. He observed
pretty convincing excess heat. I do not know of any replications.
His electrochemistry was the cleanest and most exacting I have have
ever seen. He had cathodes that ran for months that I thought were
fresh out of the aqua regia. Astounding! I doubt many people could
replicate the cleanliness, never mind the heat.
Au-H and Au-D are examples of unexplored alleys in the exploding
parameter space McKubre talked about during the ACS press conference.
Yes. Without guiding theory, exploration will take a very long time.
But as soon as the theories start getting close, they will suggest
explorations, and success in these will serve to partially validate
the theories, until, in the end, hopefully, it all becomes
well-known. There will always be unexplored frontiers, though.
That there have been so many apparently successful experiments and so
few (exact) replications is tragic, one of the things that impeded
this field, which is exactly why I'm doing what I'm doing. I've
written before what might have been part of the problem. If you are
working in a field where there might be huge glory and rewards for
being the first to find the Big Secret, you may want to keep trying
new things to be The One Who Finds The Big Secret. Replicating
someone else's work? Boring. Leave it to the grad students.
Oops! No grad students. They all went away because they were told
that if they did their work with cold fusion, forget that PhD. It's
amusing to read the crap on phys.org from this guy who thinks that a
mention of the repression is "whining." It's just the effing history.
Bart Simon, Undead Science, the sociological study of the whole
sordid affair. While it couldn't stop the progress re cold fusion, it
sure did put a huge dent in it.
Well, the first inquiries about actually buying kits from me were
from a professor who wanted them for grad student projects, to be
published as replications. I think it will happen, one way or
another. And it will keep happening until it is so boring and so
well-established that nobody will bother any more, except maybe at
the high school science fair level. I'd say that we are on the way,
fasten your seat belt, things might change fairly rapidly.
