Bubble Fusion - Oak Ridge Failed Replication

Oak Ridge Failed Replication

The results were so startling that the Oak Ridge National Laboratory asked two independent researchers,D. Shapira and M. J. Saltmarsh, to repeat the experiment using more sophisticated neutron detection equipment. They reported that the neutron release was consistent with random coincidence. A rebuttal by Taleyarkhan and the other authors of the original report said that the Shapira and Saltmarsh report failed to account for significant differences in experimental setup, including over an inch of shielding between the neutron detector and the sonoluminescing acetone. According to Taleyarkhan et al., when properly considering those differences, the results are consistent with fusion.

As early as 2002, while experimental work was still in progress, Aaron Galonsky of Michigan State University, in a letter to the journal Science expressed doubts about the claim made by the Taleyarkhan team. In Galonsky's opinion, the observed neutrons were too high in energy to be from a deuterium-deuterium (d-d) fusion reaction. In their response (published on the same page), the Taleyarkhan team provided detailed convincing arguments and concluded that the energy was "reasonably close" to that which was expected.

In February 2005 the documentary series Horizon commissioned the collaboration of two leading sonoluminescence researchers, Seth Putterman and Kenneth S. Suslick, to reproduce Taleyarkhan's work. Using similar acoustic parameters, deuterated acetone, similar bubble nucleation, and a much more sophisticated neutron detection device, the researchers could find no evidence of a fusion reaction.