4 ms·

Shouldn't there be some kind of radiation detectable if fusion did occur?

• robocat 6y ago
  It could easily be that the radiation is well below the noise floor for background radiation or cosmic rays. The experiment doesn’t allow for selecting the type of radiation, and if the fusion is different from normal then the signature could be strange. Detecting elements can be done for incredibly small amounts, but instead the problem is avoiding contamination.
  • gnufx 6y ago
    It's a characteristic of this stuff claiming to be doing nuclear physics that you actually avoid real nuclear physics (gamma and neutron detection) and possibly hand-wave it away like that. I used to study sub-barrier fusion reactions with palladium and sensitive detectors, and all this business was risible from the start.
  • lumost 6y ago
    There's a non zero chance that the transmutations would also be due to cosmic rays.