Every few years, a new claim of successful cold fusion shows up in the news. It's the mythical holy grail of energy production. Nuclear fusion—the mashing together of two hydrogen atoms into a helium atom with an accompanying release of energy—is currently only the province of stars, requiring tremendous pressure and heat to succeed. Cold fusion, which is still very much a fantasy, aims to do the same without the pressure and heat. While we continue to see false progress toward viable cold fusion, our goals in the realm of real fusion may have just become a little more realized.
On May 22, Yoshiaki Arata has successfully demonstrated a cold fusion nuclear reactor at Osaka University in Japan. It continuously generated excess energy (heat) and Helium-4 from ZrO2-nano-Pd sample powders under D2 gas charging at high pressure. The public demonstration was done in front of 60 people from different universities and companies in Japan, as well as of representatives from six major newspapers and two television stations. Yoshiaki Arata is a respected physicist in Japan who has been the recipent of Japan's highest award, the Emperor's Prize, and is the first person to have performed thermonuclear fusion research in Japan. Sources: http://physicsworld.com/blog/2008/05/coldfusion_demonstration_a_suc_1.html http://newenergytimes.com/news/2008/29img/Arata-Demo.htm
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