At 04:27 AM 11/30/2012, Teslaalset wrote:
<http://worldwide.espacenet.com/publicationDetails/description?CC=US&NR=8303865B1&KC=B1&FT=D&ND=&date=20121106&DB=&locale=en_EP>http://worldwide.espacenet.com/publicationDetails/description?CC=US&NR=8303865B1&KC=B1&FT=D&ND=&date=20121106&DB=&locale=en_EP
A better page to see the full US patent is at
http://worldwide.espacenet.com/publicationDetails/originalDocument?CC=US&NR=8303865B1&KC=B1&FT=D&ND=&date=20121106&DB=&locale=en_EP
Congratulations to Dennis Cravens on this patent.
There is a detailed description of an experiment. Does anyone know if
this work has been replicated?
This is a *huge* problem with cold fusion research. There are
hundreds of fascinating reports that appear to show a clear nuclear
anomaly, but very few are replicated, and, as far as I can tell,
there are very few replication efforts.
*General replication* of the Fleischmann-Pons Heat Effect was
accomplished hundreds of times, but specific experimental
replications are rare. (The Cravens work is not clearly FPHE work,
which I define as anomalous heat from palladium deuteride, generally
with electrolytic loading of deuterium; it's possible, with caution,
to extend this to gas-loading of palladium. It gets murkier when
other metals are used.
Because there is so much hot air on the topic of FPHE replication,
much hinging on the definition of "replication," I'll summarize the
situation briefly.
The FPHE has been validated. Anomalous heat is seen with substantial
frequency from highly loaded PdD. There is a recent paper by
Shanahan, so far self-published, that purports to maintain criticism
of this claim; the essence of it is that Shanahan is insisting on his
claim of excess heat being caused by a Calibration Constant Shift
(CCS); however, CCS would apply only to some forms of calorimetry,
and, it appears, specifically not to the original FP isoperibolic
calorimetry, which was calibrated daily, nor to flow calorimetry.
The shallow DoE review in 2004 nevertheless came up with 50% of the
reviewers considering the evidence for anomalous heat to be
conclusive. The extreme skeptical position on this disappeared from
the journals practically a decade ago; Shanahan is the last gasp of
the pseudoskeptical position.
I will separately review his paper, but here is a link to it:
http://sti.srs.gov/fulltext/SRNL-STI-2012-00678.pdf
On the first page of that link is an acknowledgement of funding. The
contract cited is a general maintenance contract for the Savannah
River Site of the U.S. Department of Energy, and Shanahan justifies
his research under a concern that unexpected heat from metal hydrides
could cause a serious accident. How he proceeds with this issue is
appalling, demonstrating incompetence caused by an over-absorption in
his own ideas and how he has been personally treated. He does not
resolve the safety issue, but waves it away, apparently considering
his own highly inadequate proposals for prosaic explanations to be
sufficient to eliminate concern.
His proposals have not been tested. Shanahan is an armchair critic,
and ignores the bulk of the evidence, focusing instead on whatever he
can assert as *possibly* explaining *some* results.
And it appears that he's the best the skeptics have.
For that reason, I'm declaring my intention to write a paper
collecting and examining criticism of the central results that
indicate the reality of cold fusion. A primary goal of this paper
will be to identify specific research to be performed to resolve open
issues or to nail down results, with a further intention being, then,
to obtain funding for such research.
Both U.S. DoE reports (1989 and 2004) recommended further research,
to be funded under existing programs, but that was lost in the noise,
and actual grant applications under this were summarily rejected,
with reasonable suspicion of pressure from the physics establishment,
such as the APS through Robert Park. I am hearing, now, of funding
being yanked from already-approved applications, and recently.
The zombie is still walking.
