Scientific 'Notations'

Ever heard about such research findings and thought: “People get PAID to do this?” Well, you surely will when you read the list of winners of the Ig Nobel Prize, the annual award given by the Annals of Improbable Research magazine for oddball but sometimes practical scientific achievements.

• Nutrition: Massimiliano Zampini and Charles Spence for demonstrating that food tastes better when it sounds better (report fromThe Guardian).
• Peace: The Swiss Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology and the citizens ofSwitzerlandfor adopting the legal principle thatplants have dignity.
• Archaeology: Astolfo Gomes de Mello Araujo and Jose Carlos Marcelino for showing armadillos can scramble the contents of an archaeological dig (report fromNatural History).
• Biology: Marie-Christine Cadiergues, Christel Joubert and Michel Franc for discovering that fleas that live on a dog canjump higherthan fleas that live on a cat.
• Medicine: Dan Ariely for demonstrating that expensive fake medicine is more effective than cheap fake medicine (report inStanford GSB News).
• Cognitive science: Toshiyuki Nakagaki, Hiroyasu Yamada, Ryo Kobayashi, Atsushi Tero, Akio Ishiguro and Agota Toth for discovering that slime molds can solve puzzles (report inMath in the Media).
• Economics: Geoffrey Miller, Joshua Tyber and Brent Jordan for discovering thatexotic dancers earn morewhen at peak fertility.
• Physics: Dorian Raymer and Douglas Smith for proving that heaps of string or hair willinevitably tangle.
• Chemistry: Sheree Umpierre, Joseph Hill and Deborah Anderson for discovering that Coca-Cola is aneffective spermicide, and C.Y. Hong, C.C. Shieh, P. Wu and B.N. Chiang for provingit is not(report atSnopes.com).
• Literature: David Sims for his study “You Bastard: A Narrative Exploration of the Experience of Indignation within Organizations’ (report fromThe Boston Globe).