Our friends at Improbable Research awarded the annual Ig Nobel Prizes last night at Harvard's Sanders Theater for research that makes you laugh, and then think. This is the 21st year for the awards. Ten prizes were awarded in different disciplines; here are some of the more notable:
Pictured are researchers Darryl Gwynne and David Rentz accepting their prize for biology. See the complete list of winners at Improbable Research. Link
Watch the entire ceremony on video. Link
BIOLOGY PRIZE: Darryl Gwynne (of CANADA and AUSTRALIA and the USA) and David Rentz (of AUSTRALIA and the USA) for discovering that a certain kind of beetle mates with a certain kind of Australian beer bottle
CHEMISTRY PRIZE: Makoto Imai, Naoki Urushihata, Hideki Tanemura, Yukinobu Tajima, Hideaki Goto, Koichiro Mizoguchi and Junichi Murakami of JAPAN, for determining the ideal density of airborne wasabi (pungent horseradish) to awaken sleeping people in case of a fire or other emergency, and for applying this knowledge to invent the wasabi alarm.
LITERATURE PRIZE: John Perry of Stanford University, USA, for his Theory of Structured Procrastination, which says: To be a high achiever, always work on something important, using it as a way to avoid doing something that's even more important.
PEACE PRIZE: Arturas Zuokas, the mayor of Vilnius, LITHUANIA, for demonstrating that the problem of illegally parked luxury cars can be solved by running them over with an armored tank.
Pictured are researchers Darryl Gwynne and David Rentz accepting their prize for biology. See the complete list of winners at Improbable Research. Link
Watch the entire ceremony on video. Link