At work this morning, I found myself reading a story about the Ig Nobel Prize on The Register. To quote them:
Luminaries from the world of improbable research last night gathered at Harvard’s Sanders Theatre for the 19th Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony, which saw honours awarded to a gas mask bra, research proving cows with names give more milk, and similarly vital work showing that “kitchen refuse can be reduced more than 90 per cent in mass by using bacteria extracted from the faeces of giant pandas”.
The Ig Nobel Prize is, of course, a parody of the real Nobel Prize, focusing on achievements that “first make people laugh, and then make them think”. Some of the big winners this year were:
Gas Mask Bras
A bra, that “in an emergency, can be quickly converted into a pair of gas masks, one for the brassiere wearer and one to be given to some needy bystander”:
Cows with names make more milk!
“Exploring Stock Managers’ Perceptions of the Human-Animal Relationship on Dairy Farms and an Association with Milk Production”.
This ground-breaking bovine probe demonstrated the average amount of milk produced by a cow over its annual ten-month lactation period is 13,198 pints, but that cows with names yielded 454 pints more, on average.
Giant Panda shit can make your rubbish smaller
“Microbial Treatment of Kitchen Refuse With Enzyme-Producing Thermophilic Bacteria From Giant Panda Faeces” showing that “kitchen refuse can be reduced more than 90 per cent in mass by using bacteria extracted from the faeces of giant pandas”.
