August 28, 2008

Purdue Punishes Professor Who Led Disputed Fusion Experiment

By Richard Monastersky

Purdue University has stripped a researcher of his named professorship and limited his mentor status with graduate students in response to what it deemed his "deplorable" actions regarding a controversial fusion experiment.

The sanctions continue a lengthy saga concerning Rusi P. Taleyarkhan, a professor of nuclear engineering, who captured worldwide attention in 2002 when he claimed that he had used intense sound waves to compress and heat bubbles to the point that hydrogen