Purdue University announced today that one of its nuclear engineers was guilty of scientific misconduct in work related to his potentially revolutionary findings about creating fusion from bubbles.
The announcement represented an about-face for the university, which more than a year ago declared that the scientist, Rusi P. Taleyarkhan, was not guilty of misconduct. The university had come under fire from members of the U.S. House of Representatives for that earlier assertion, and subsequently started a new investigation.
The university has posted the results of its investigation in a report dated April 18. The U.S. Office of Naval Research, which financed the work of Mr. Taleyarkhan, praised the new Purdue investigation, calling it, among other things, “prompt.”
Mr. Taleyarkhan has 30 days to appeal the findings. —Richard Monastersky
