16TH ANNUAL IG NOBEL AWARDS

Well sure, we all heard about the great Nobel Prize wins the U.S. received this year in medicine and physics. But Nobel Prize time also means it’s once again time for the Ig Nobel Prize. The Ig Nobels may seem a bit silly, but all the research is real and has been published (yes, in legit scientific and medical journals). They may not receive any money, but their awards are presented by real Nobel Prize winners. My all time favorite winner for this year has to be Francis Fesmire and Majed Odeh’s team for the cure of hiccups through rectal message. Yup, all you need to do to cure those pesky hiccups is stick your finger up your butt.

My second favorite winner is the team of Al-Houty and Al-Mussalam for showing that dung beetles are finicky eaters. They won’t eat just any ole’ poop. What’s really funny is that this research fell under the “Nutritionâ€? category.

One winner whose research may actually be of some use is Bart Knol’s findings that mosquitoes are attracted to the smell of stinky feet. Apparently, the female mosquito Anopheles gambiae (the one that transmits malaria) is very attracted to the smell of limburger cheese and human feet. So keep your feet stinky cheese free and you should be fine fending off those nasty mosquitoes.

Be sure to check out all other winners for this year’s Igs. They are all very entertaining.