Nuclear fusion persists at ultralow energies inside metal foils

Physicists at UC Davis and Lawrence Berkeley Lab have discovered that nuclear fusion persists at unexpectedly low energies when deuterium nuclei collide inside metal foils. Normally, fusion should nearly vanish below a critical threshold—yet experiments with palladium and titanium showed the reaction rate plateauing instead, even exceeding theoretical predictions for isolated nuclei by an extraordinary factor. Physics World reports the mechanism appears to involve the metal's electron cloud, which shields the repulsion between nuclei and lets them approach more closely. An independent Polish research group saw similar effects in zirconium and titanium, offering corroboration—though the two teams disagree on the underlying cause. The absolute fusion rates remain far too small for practical energy generation, but the work opens a new physical regime where materials actively shape how nuclear reactions occur, with possible near-term applications in compact neutron sources and longer-term implications for nuclear research.

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