The public ate it up. Trouble is, cold fusion didn't pan out - although there are true believers out there, including Fleischmann and Pons, who say mainstream science is deliberately ignoring their work. For now, we are left with hot fusion, a massive research project involving thousands of scientists working in labs and hunched over computers from Cambridge to Nagoya, a project that employs incredibly complicated machines such as the gigantic laser arrays harnessed to supercomputers at the National Ignition Facility in Livermore, California. It is expensive. It is difficult to comprehend.
Progress is measured in tiny gains.
There is little fun and very little that is sexy going on here. But the fact remains that fusion can't be done in jelly jars on the kitchen sink. You may know the name Bill Gates. You may know Steve Jobs. But, as much as they have affected our lives, they are entrepreneurs more than scientists.