Yeong Kim's credentials are longer than mine, probably longer than all the commentators on this forum together. That is why it is important to read his published, peer-reviewed work before going out on a limb here. http://www.physics.purdue.edu/people/faculty/yekim/BECNF-Ni-Hydrogen.pdf Worried about Ni->Cu being endo-thermic , this will fix you right up. Wondering how such a fusion reaction *could work? This is a theory that is at least peer-reviewed.

It is claimed transmutation is occurring. The Swedish skeptics society examined what were purported to be byproducts. However, everyone must remember and treat this like a black box experiment. Until it is independently observed what goes into the reaction chamber, and then what comes out of it, we are forced to take every claim as unsubstantiated, and refuse to draw conclusions. That said, there is no harm in speculating. What sorts of things would have to happen to accrete and decay until one has a stable copper isotope in the sample? Or a nickle one of higher atomic number? BUT then one must hold their conclusions loosely. This is a black box experiment, so all that can be known is what is put into the apparatus and what comes out in terms of energy. To attempt to make more of it is to begin to break the laws of scientific experimentation. Unless, what can be inferred is done so with qualification. For example the Swedish Skeptics determined that the output energy was too high to be explained by any known chemical process. The test ran long enough they were satisfied the energy derived was more than could be derived by any chemical process of that size. That conclusion, has validity. Because it was an indirect but acceptable conclusion from the observed facts.

Actually its not New Physics, its origin comes out of FC Frank in 1947 published in Nature. Then more work was done in 1957 published in Physics Review. There have been a few very interesting papers published in peer-reviewed lit in the past 2 decades, building momentum for the science.

Look, I don't know if this is a scam. However, its not Ni52-CU53 that is supposed to create energy. It is Cu53's instability and the idea of a positron decay that leads to Ni 53. Then a proton accretion by muon superposition (its just a theory out there) yielding Cu54. then decaying to Ni 54 by positron decay, then a proton accretion again to Cu55 and so on... each decay destroys matter -> energy. Proton accretion? Well it has been proposed that there is a probability that a muon can appear over a hydrogen atom changing the proton by removing its charge. Without the charge, the coulomb barrier can be far more easily breached. Like the Pd+dt experiments, Nickle has a similar lattice structure that absorbs hydrogen. (Pd and Ni are unique metals because they absorb H + dt. ) The nickle lattice structure is proposed to enable the muon'd proton to approach the Ni nucleus and appear inside the coulomb barrier, where the strong nuclear force takes over. Hey this isn't my theory but its one of several bouncing around. It was published in the journal of nature here: http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1986Natur.321..127J

Its getting a little old, but this 60 minutes piece opened a lot of minds: http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=4955212n

If Hydrogen's nucleus, a proton, is superimposed by a muon, it temporarily looses its positive charge. With no charge there is no coulomb barrier. The muon only exists for and extremely short time, but any neutralized protons inside the coulomb radius would be violently pulled into the Ni nucleus as soon as the muon is gone, then what is nickle going to do? That tight bonding does it no good, and is from what we can tell, it is irrelevant.

Actually, Rossi's device produces radiation. However that radiation is not neutron radiation nor is is Alpha particle radiation (both deadly at high energies). Rossi's device potentially creates positrons *actually a form of anti matter, but as small as an electron* and it creates Beta particles (also known as electrons) That is what makes this, if it actually works, so novel. Most of the decays are in nano-seconds or milliseconds so within 1/2 hour of shutting it down there should be no unstable isotopes left. Their instability being of no danger anyway.