Remembering Akira Kawasaki
by Peter Gluck

I recently learned that my good friend Akira Kawasaki of Los Angeles, Calif., passed away in August.

Unfortunately, the old soldiers of cold fusion are dying; they have not learned how to fade away. Gone is Chris Tinsley, at 54 a victim of a heart attack. Giuliano Preparata’s genius flame was extinguished by cancer. Gene Mallove was killed by dark forces; we never will know how powerful these forces were.

And now the lady with the scythe has taken my good friend Akira Kawasaki, who is perhaps less-famous and -known, but cold fusion, and his friends, including me, owe him a great “thank you.”

He was a most generous, enthusiastic, helpful, wise and charming man—and strong, because, like old age, cold fusion is not made for sissies. We have discussed everything cold fusion and more for eight years via the Internet.

Death used heavy artillery to defeat him: numerous, intense chronic illnesses. Throughout the ordeal, his body became lethargic, but his soul remained bright and his optimism indestructible. Akira believed and, I hope, now knows for sure that eventually cold fusion will win and prosper and give energy to mankind. Perhaps he knows now how this will be done and when, too.

Most of us will remember him taking photos and making video recordings at conferences and workshops. Those on the front line, the staff of Infinite Energy magazine, and other underfunded researchers, know how Akira generously helped them—morally and financially—in an unforgettable manner.

But only a few know that Akira was a formidable, self-made cold fusion experimenter, and he obtained some very interesting results. I enjoyed his hospitality in the autumn of 2000 and saw his PC-controlled setup in the garage; it was working for months, continuously.

Akira conceived and built it alone, based on the results and ideas of Arata and Les Case: gas-phase, high-vacuum alternating with deuterium gas—a mixture of very fine palladium and carbon graphite, as I recall, at high temperatures.

And he had an original system to vibrate the catalytic bed. He measured nuclear particles, but he thought he also saw episodes of local thermal runaway: a logical, bright approach.

I do not know more. He kept the details of his experiments secret, and he intended to publish them in Infinite Energy magazine.

Akira Kawasaki has a place in the Pantheon of cold fusion. Please remember him when the good days arrive.