COLLEGE STATION, Texas -- Texas A&M University's top professors have petitioned for the demotion of a colleague, saying his research project on turning mercury into gold is as bogus as 'mining green cheese on the moon.'
The group, which included a Nobel Prize winner, called on the university provost Tuesday to strip John O'M Bockris of his title as distinguished professor of chemistry.
The petition said, 'We believe that Bockris' recent activities have made the terms 'Texas A&M' and 'Aggie' objects of derisive laughter throughout the world among scientists and engineers, not to mention a large segment of the lay public.'
Bockris, whose research at Texas A&M included a project that purported to change mercury into gold, has been the center of several internal investigations at the school. He has denied any wrongdoing.
The petition, signed by 23 of the school's 28 distinguished professors, said, 'For a trained scientist to claim, or support anyone else's claim to have transmuted elements is difficult for us to believe and is not more acceptable than to claim to have invented a gravity shield, revived the dead or to be mining green cheese on the moon.'
In response to the petition, Bockris said Wednesday, 'I obviously wouldn't do something that was bonkers, would I? I am in full command of my senses.'
'He categorically denies any allegation of scientific misconduct and I believe the evidence will show that he didn't engage in any misconduct,' said Bockris' lawyer, Gaines West.
Interim Texas A&M President E. Dean Gage has already ordered an internal inquiry into Bockris' project. The academics signing the petition have labeled the project fraud. They said the project was underwritten by a man who was later charged with federal securities fraud in an unrelated case.
A&M officials were trying to determine whether the project violated professional standards or was an improper expenditure of money that was intended for research.
Among the petitioners was Sir Derek Barton, a Nobel naureate.