Cold Fusion

In the spring of 1989, two electrochemists promised the world an energy utopia - clean, cheap, and abundant energy without harmful side effects on the environment. It was the scientific story of the century, broadcast around the globe. Martin Fleischmann and B. Stanley Pons, working at the University of Utah, claimed to have duplicated the high-temperature process powering the sun, at room temperature in a small jar on a laboratory tabletop. This work documents the development of the cold fusion saga and provides a careful and thorough study of the scientific and other issues relating to the controversy. The account concludes with a discussion of the lessons to be learned from the episode and the implications for the proper conduct of science. Drawing parallels with other cases of "pathological science", the text concludes that the history of cold fusion demonstrates once again that science works by exposing and correcting its own errors. This new paperback edition brings the cold fusion up to date, including an evaluation of events over the year since publication of the hardback in May 1992.Table of ContentPress conference; prior events; confirmations, retractions and confusion; a panel is appointed; hearing before a Government committee; cold fusion frenzy peaks; publication of the panel's report; where are the fusion products?; promotion of claims for cold fusion; Utah born and bred; cold fusion and polywater; pathological science; lessons; appendices: University of Utah press release, Energy Research Advisory Board cold fusion panel, chronology of the cold fusion saga.