Cold fusion research

Cold fusion research began with an experiment in 1989:

• an insulated glass jar containing deuterium oxide (commonly known as heavy water) in which two electrodes were immersed, one of them a coil of platinum wire, the other a rod of palladium - a precious metal comparable in value to gold. A small voltage between the electrodes decomposed the deuterium oxide into oxygen and deuterium (a form of hydrogen), some of which was absorbed into the palladium.
• This was high school chemistry. But Fleischmann believed that if the process continued long enough, deuterium atoms could become so tightly packed in the palladium, fusion would occur. [1]

A science reporter following up years later wrote:

• I found myself faced with an impossible choice: Either 200 chemists and physicists had spent the past nine years doing incompetent experiments and engaging in full-blown self-delusion, or a genuine discovery of great importance had been discredited so thoroughly, some ornery retirees and tenured professors were the only ones who still had the courage even to mention it. [2]