cold fusion or low-temperature fusion, nuclear fusion of deuterium, an isotope of hydrogen hydrogen (hī`drəjən) [Gr.,=water forming], gaseous chemical element; symbol H; at. no. 1; at. wt. 1.00794; m.p. −259.
..... Click the link for more information. , at or relatively near room temperature. Fusion, the reaction involved in the release of the destructive energy of a hydrogen bomb neutron bomb, which would have a minimum trigger and a nonfissionable tamper; there would be blast effects and a hail of lethal neutrons but almost no radioactive fallout; this theoretically would cause minimal physical damage to buildings and equipment but kill most living things.
..... Click the link for more information. , requires extremely high temperatures, and investigations of fusion as a possible energy source have focused on the problems involved in designing an apparatus to contain and sustain such a reaction (see nuclear energy nuclear energy, the energy stored in the nucleus of an atom and released through fission, fusion, or radioactivity . In these processes a small amount of mass is converted to energy according to the relationship E = mc², where E
..... Click the link for more information. ; nuclear reactor nuclear reactor, device for producing controlled release of nuclear energy . Reactors can be used for research or for power production. A research reactor is designed to produce various beams of radiation for experimental application; the heat produced is a waste
..... Click the link for more information. ). In 1989 B. Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann, chemists at the Univ. of Utah, announced that an experiment conducted at room temperature using platinum and palladium electrodes immersed in heavy water (deuterium oxide) had produced excess heat and other byproducts that they ascribed to a fusion reaction. Attempts to replicate their experiment produced initially conflicting results, but several early announcements of experimental confirmation were later retracted. Pons and Fleischmann were also later criticized for having skewed data to show the emission of gamma rays at an energy level typical of fusion.

Research into the possibility of cold fusion, by Fleischmann and others, nonetheless continues, because of intriguing but inconclusive experimental results—such as claims of the production of excess heat, helium, or tritium where heavy water reacts with metals—and because of the desirability of producing relatively nonpolluting fusion energy in quantity at any temperature. Cold-fusion proponents believe that the fusion mechanism is different from that of "hot fusion" in that it encompasses some type of unusual nuclear reaction in the metal lattice involving deuterium and possibly other atoms. Several dozen models to explain the observed phenomena have been advanced, but none accounts for the full range of experimental observations.

Bibliography

See F. David Peat, Cold Fusion: The Making of a Scientific Controversy (1989); F. E. Close, Too Hot to Handle: The Race for Cold Fusion (1991); J. R. Huizenga, Cold Fusion: The Scientific Fiasco of the Century (1993); G. Taubes, Bad Science: The Short Life and Weird Times of Cold Fusion (1993).

Cold Fusion

See ColdFusion.