Cold Fusion Gets a Second Look

Very quietly, now that the laughter and derision has died down, researchers have convinced the United States Department of Energy to review cold fusion research.

About 15 years ago, cold fusion was one week a panacea, and the next a laughing stock as mainstream physicists dismissed the concept as laughable. Edward Teller joked that a new elementary particle, the "meshugatron" would be required for cold fusion to occur. Meshuga is Yiddish for "crazy."

But, a small cadre of scientist continued to work and claim to have confirmed the original results of Pons and Fleischman. And, the DOE is sufficiently impressed to review their work and maybe underwrite some research.