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wmldswlxh's blog: "wmldswlxh"

created on 08/09/2011  |  http://fubar.com/wmldswlxh/b342831

Showered with paper aeroplanes, garlanded by admiring Nobel laureates, some of the world's quirkiest scientists will be honoured at a sell-out ceremony at Harvard University next week. The 21st annual Ig Nobel Prizes, conferred by Annals of Improbable Research (AIR), have become one of the most coveted prizes in science. Bringing neither personal riches nor offers of future funding, the Ig Nobels do bestow a heavy dollop of cool on their winners who, collectively, seem to put the fizz in physics and the giggles in gigabytes. Recent winners include a UK-Mexico collaboration, for perfecting a method to collect whale snot, using a remote-controlled helicopter; Dutch duo Simon Rietveld and Ilja van Beest for discovering that some forms of asthma can be treated with a roller-coaster ride; and a team from Otago University, air yeezy 2011 New Zealand, for demonstrating that, on icy footpaths in winter, people slip and fall less often if they wear socks on the outside of their shoes. British scientists traditionally fare well at the Ig Nobels (there are 10 categories covering similar disciplines to the Nobels, from chemistry and economics to peace, but also including public health, engineering, biology, and interdisciplinary research). In 2009, Catherine Douglas and Peter Rowlinson of Newcastle University won for revealing that cows with names give more milk than cows that are nameless. Howard Stapleton of Merthyr Tydfil, triumphed in 2006, for inventing an electro-mechanical teenager repellent (a device that makes annoying high-pitched noise designed to be audible to teenagers but not to adults). And in 2005, an award went to Claire Rind and Peter Simmons of Newcastle University (again) for electrically monitoring the activity of a brain cell in a locust that was being shown selected highlights of Star Wars. If it all sounds like a lot of geeks getting together to let their long hair down, whip off their white coats and, over a glass of champagne, sort out some sticky issues (like Edward Cussler and Brian Gettelfinger, University of Minnesota, winners for the experiment: can people swim faster in syrup or in water?), you wouldn't be far wrong.

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