Enhanced nuclear fusion in the sub-keV energy regime

Abstract

Nuclear fusion requires overcoming or traversing a repulsive Coulomb barrier of hundreds of kiloelectronvolts, rendering the probability of fusion at sub-keV energies vanishingly small. Yet in condensed matter, the electronic and structural environment of reacting nuclei can profoundly alter fusion rates. Here we demonstrate that deuterium-deuterium fusion within metallic foils exhibits a pronounced enhancement and reaction yield plateau below energies of 2.5 keV- contrary to the expected exponential suppression with decreasing energy. Using a dual-chamber platform that combines electrochemical deuterium loading with ion-beam bombardment, we show that fusion yields in palladium and titanium hydrides are enhanced by over 10^18 compared to theoretical bare-nucleus fusion rates. These results demonstrate that access to low-energy fusion processes can be governed by materials degrees of freedom. This materials-driven fusion regime establishes a reproducible, tunable framework for studying and ultimately engineering nuclear reactions in solids. While the reaction rates reported here are low, these insights into materials-modulated fusion processes offer a potential foundation for understanding how condensed-matter environments could influence future fusion-energy concepts.