2005 Ig Nobel Prize Winners

[Knight-Dragon]

I am sure the guys who won the literature prize must be familiar to most of you...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4318888.stm

Cutting edge studies on artificial dogs' testicles, locusts which watch Star Wars and penguin defaecation have been honoured with Ig Nobel awards.

The spoof prizes reward scientific achievements which "cannot, or should not, be reproduced".

Four genuine Nobel prize winners presented the much-coveted awards in a ceremony at Harvard University, US.

A study called Pressures Produced When Penguins Pooh - Calculations on Avian Defaecation was honoured with an award.

Authors Victor Benno Meyer-Rochow, of the International University Bremen, and Jozsef Gal, of Lorand Eotvos University in Hungary, were unable to obtain visas to pick up their Fluid Dynamics prize.

"Let's hope it had nothing to do with the explosive nature of our work," Mr Meyer-Rochow said.

The Ig Nobel awards were founded in 1991 by science magazine editor Marc Abrahams to shed light on some of the bizarre projects being embarked upon by researchers across the globe.

"Some of the projects were staggering," said Mr Abrahams. "It made you laugh and then it made you think, and from the beginning that's what this has been about."

Ig Nobel winners

Medicine - Gregg Miller from the US for his invention of Neuticles - rubber replacement testicles for neutered dogs that are available in varying sizes and degrees of firmness. "Considering my parents thought I was an idiot when I was a kid, this is a great honour," said Mr Miller.

Peace - A UK team for their pioneering research into the activity of locusts' brain cells while the insects watched clips from the Star Wars films.

Physics - John Maidstone from Australia for his part in an experiment that began in 1927 in which a glob of black tar drips through a funnel every nine years. Mr Maidstone shared the prize with a late colleague who died sometime after the second drop.

Biology - The University of Adelaide for "painstakingly smelling and cataloguing the peculiar odours produced by 131 different species of frogs when the frogs were feeling stressed".

Chemistry - A University of Minnesota team who set out to prove whether people can swim faster in water or sugar syrup.

Economics - A Massachusetts inventor who designed an alarm clock that runs away and hides when it goes off.

Nutrition - A Japanese researcher who photographed and analysed every meal he had consumed during a period of 34 years.

Literature - The many Nigerians who introduced millions of e-mail users to a "cast of rich characters... each of whom requires just a small amount of expense money so as to obtain access to the great wealth to which they are entitled".

Agricultural History - A study entitled The Significance of Mr Richard Buckley's Exploding Trousers: Reflections on an Aspect of Technological Change in New Zealand Dairy-Farming between the World Wars.

Fluid Dynamics - Pressures Produced When Penguins Pooh - Calculations on Avian Defaecation.

 

[SuperBeaverInc.]

I wonder if the Nigerians accepted the award in person?

 

[Irish Caesar]

Apparently Mr. Miller has made a lot of money selling neuticles.

Somehow, that wasn't how I planned on getting rich, but...to each his own, right?

 

[SuperBeaverInc.]

If you were making lots of money, would you really be complaining?

 

[Irish Caesar]

Of course not!

In fact, if I was making lots of money making prosthetic gonads for dogs, I could buy myself whatever I wanted!

like a girlfriend, perhaps...

 

[SuperBeaverInc.]

like a girlfriend, perhaps...

I believe that is called prostitution

 

[vbraun]

I love these things.

 

[Irish Caesar]

I love these things.

Ig Nobel awards or neuticles?

I think he should have won an award just for that brand name

 

[Bigfoot]

Ig Nobels are handed out annually during a gala celebration at Harvard University to honor the humorous, creative and odd side of science. The satirical awards – first given out in 1991– are intended to "spur people's interest in science, medicine, and technology by making people laugh, and then think."

THE JUDGES

The awards are presented by the Annals of Improbable Research (AIR), a science and humor magazine founded in 1994 by the former editor and staff of the Journal of Irreproducible Results. "The magazine's editorial board of more than 50 distinguished scientists includes eight Nobel laureates, IQ record holder Marilyn Vos Savant, and a convicted felon." A Board of Governors reviews the nominations, investigates the research claims of the finalists and selects the winners.

SOME 2005 WINNERS

ECONOMICS: Gauri Nanda of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, for inventing an alarm clock that runs away and hides, repeatedly, thus ensuring that people do get out of bed, and thus theoretically adding many productive hours to the workday.

PHYSICS:John Mainstone and the late Thomas Parnell of the University of Queensland, Australia, for patiently conducting an experiment that began in the year 1927 – in which a glob of congealed black tar has been slowly, slowly dripping through a funnel, at a rate of approximately one drop every nine years.

MEDICINE:Gregg A. Miller of Oak Grove, Mo., for inventing Neuticles – artificial replacement testicles for dogs, which are available in three sizes and three degrees of firmness.

PEACE:Claire Rind and Peter Simmons of Newcastle University, in the U.K., for electrically monitoring the activity of a brain cell in a locust while that locust was watching selected highlights from the movie "Star Wars."

CHEMISTRY:Edward Cussler of the University of Minnesota and Brian Gettelfinger of the University of Minnesota and the University of Wisconsin, for conducting a careful experiment to settle the longstanding scientific question: Can people swim faster in syrup or in water?

NUTRITION: Dr. Yoshiro Nakamats of Tokyo, Japan, for photographing and retrospectively analyzing every meal he has consumed during a period of 34 years (and counting).

SOME PAST WINNERS

2004 MEDICINE: Steven Stack of Wayne State University, Detroit, Mich., and James Gundlach of Auburn University, Auburn, Ala., for their published report "The Effect of Country Music on Suicide."

2004 PUBLIC HEALTH: Jillian Clarke of the Chicago High School for Agricultural Sciences, and then Howard University, for investigating the scientific validity of the Five-Second Rule about whether it's safe to eat food that's been dropped on the floor.

2004 ENGINEERING: Donald J. Smith and his father, the late Frank J. Smith, of Orlando, Fla., for patenting the combover (U.S. Patent No. 4,022,227).

YOU KIDDING ME?

Are these things real? Yes, indeed. You can look it up. That’s why Annals of Improbable Research gives references online.

The only exceptions came in 1991, the very first year that Ig Nobel Prizes were awarded, and 1994. In 1991, three additional prizes were given for apocryphal achievements. In 1994, one prize was based on what turned out to be erroneous press accounts. Those four apocryphal achievements are not included in the list on this page. All the other prizes, in all years, were awarded for genuine achievements, according to AIR.

LINK

I guess you can get a research grant for just about anything.

 

[Abaddon]

Economics - A Massachusetts inventor who designed an alarm clock that runs away and hides when it goes off.

That sounds really actually useful!

 

[Bozo Erectus]

I wonder if the Nigerians accepted the award in person?

They almost couldnt make it because of money problems, but they sent me an email and asked for a loan so they could buy the plane tickets. Naturally I sent it to them.

 

[Lockesdonkey]

You've got to love the AIR. The Igs are wonderful. I have the book, somewhere on a shelf in my room...

 

[Renata]

Economics - A Massachusetts inventor who designed an alarm clock that runs away and hides when it goes off.

I want one. Where do I send my check?

Physics - John Maidstone from Australia for his part in an experiment that began in 1927 in which a glob of black tar drips through a funnel every nine years. Mr Maidstone shared the prize with a late colleague who died sometime after the second drop.

I've actually heard of this before! Can't remember where, but it must have been 15 or 20 years ago.

 

[Sophie 378]

Try a New Scientist article - except oh rats that doesn't say where to buy them either.

 

[Abaddon]

BUMP: just had to, these guys are my lecturers!!!! last week we even hooked up locust legs to an ocilloscope in order to measure responce so stimulus... i swear they are obsessed with locusts!

(i do Zoology, second year at Newcastle Uni)


PEACE:Claire Rind and Peter Simmons of Newcastle University, in the U.K., for electrically monitoring the activity of a brain cell in a locust while that locust was watching selected highlights from the movie "Star Wars."