At 03:43 PM 12/19/2012, Harry Veeder wrote:
STMicroelectronics report on their version of the Celani apparatus:
http://www.22passi.it/coherence2012/coherence%2014%20dicembre%202012%20Celani%20wire.pdf
On page 2 it says over a couple of charts:
"Neutron and gamma continuous recording in ST
lab. No difference for spectra during experiments
showing extra heat and background"
Does this mean they did not detect any anomalous gamma or neutrons emissions?
If so then it is more evidence that the Celani doesn't produce excess heat.
Jed already replied to this, I've seen, but I wanted to add my two cents.
Lack of gamma/neutron emission was considered evidence against cold
fusion, initially. Reports of neutrons, in particular, cluttered the
landscape, and were generally, if high-level (no reports were really
high in an absolute sense), found to be artifact, in some prominent
cases, or were low-level and thus subject to doubt about whether or
not they were simply unusual events as to background radiation, i.e.,
cosmic rays.
The evidence for radiation never became truly strong and confirmed,
such as it was. Storms is now reporting X-rays from certain
experiments, but that's not confirmed.
However, the evidence is very strong, now, I consider it "rebuttably
conclusive" (with it being difficult to even imagine a rebuttal),
that the Fleischmann-Pons Heat Effect is due to the conversion of
deuterium to helium, for the heat/helium ratio, based on results from
a dozen research groups, is consistent with the right value, and the
correlation between heat and helium is so clear as to be quite solid,
chance-in-a-million artifact. Or less than that, really.
Yet there is no detectable gamma radiation, generally, and similarly
with neutrons; any asserted contrary findings, so far, have been at
ridiculously low levels, and probably represent, if real -- as they
seem to be, see the SPAWAR neutron findings -- very minor, rare
side-reactions, reactions with rare cell constituent elements, or
sequelae, i.e, some occasionally hot products, like hot alphas,
prodice some secondary reactions. At extremely low levels.
So the lack of radiation from any experiment is not evidence against
excess heat. It is the absence of a particular kind of evidence that
could confirm excess heat. That's all. To think otherwise is to
repeat the error of 1989-1990, where absence of expected nuclear
products was considered reason to doubt the heat results.
In 1989-1990, it was expected that if "cold fusion" were occurring,
it would be d-d fusion, nothing else. That assumption was behind much
criticism. Pons and Fleischmann knew that what they were observing
was not ordinary d-d fusion, that's why they called it, in their
original paper, an "unknown nuclear reaction." But they also had
found, they thought, neutrons, and they dedicated way too much space,
in hindsight, to speculating on an obvious possible source, some kind
of d+d -> He-3 + n reaction as a rare branch.
But He-3 was not detected, except at very low levels, as expected
from tritium found -- at levels 10^6 or so below the level expected
if the reaction was d-d fusion, which branches 50% to T + p, and 50%
to He-3 + n. T decays, slowly, to He-3 + e.
The P&F finding of neutrons was quickly exposed as artifact. Yes,
many people thought that, then, no neutrons = heat artifact.
It was a total error. The reaction is clearly, almost entirely, 2 * N
* d -> N * He-4, where N is as low as 1, but could be higher, and if
higher (N = 2 has been studied), could explain the neutron-free
reaction, through, for example, 2 D2 -> Be-8 -> 2 He-4. The problem
with this, as stated, and with a naive analysis, is that this would
be expected to produce very hot alpha particles, and a recent
Hagelstein study placed an upper limit on *common* charged particle
energies of 20 KeV. So theorists continue to labor with the problem.
But deuterium is being converted to helium, mechanism unknown, that
is a real scientific consensus at this point. Yes, there are lots of
"scientists" who doubt it, but they have not published under peer
review for roughly a decade. It's actually over, in the journals.
That news simply has not gotten around, has not penetrated completely
the fog of the anti-cold fusion cascade that occurred over 20 years
ago. It can take time.
Cascades create an impression of scientific consensus where there is
none (or, more accurately, there is a kind of consensus, but it's not
based on the scientific method, it's a social phenomenon). I got the term from
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/09/science/09tier.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
It's ironic. Gary Taubes helped create the cold fusion cascade, but
he's now spent more than a decade debunking two: positions on salt in
the diet, and fat, similarly.
