Why Don’t Pregnant Women Tip Over? Ask An Ig Noble Winner.

Photo: Fumiaki Taguchi, professor emeritus at the graduate school of medical sciences in Kitasato University, makes a speech during the Ig Noble awards ceremony at Harvard University's historic Sanders Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on Oct. 1. Taguchi is among this year's winners of the Ig Nobel Prize for developing a method to cut kitchen refuse using bacteria derived from giant panda feces.

From The Christian Science Monitor:

At Harvard University, a select group of researchers receive their Ig Noble awards.

It’s October again, which means it’s time for the Ig Nobles – a set of prizes awarded to discoveries “that cannot, or should not, be reproduced.” The Ig Nobels were dished out last night at Sanders Theater, on the campus of Harvard University, and the awards, which cover categories ranging from physics to physiology, appear to have gone to the appropriate “innovators.”

Here’s the full list of winners, courtesy of the Associated Press:

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Herschel Scans Hidden Milky Way

Herschel trains two eyes, Pacs and Spire, on our Galaxy's centre

From The BBC:

A remarkable view of our Galaxy has been obtained by Europe's billion-euro Herschel Space Observatory.

The telescope was put in a special scanning mode to map a patch of sky.

The images reveal in exquisite detail the dense, contorted clouds of cold gas that are collapsing in on themselves to form new stars.

Herschel, which has the largest mirror ever put on an orbiting telescope, was launched in May as a flagship mission of the European Space Agency.

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GOCE Harnesses Ion Propulsion To Capture First 'Gravity Map' Of Earth

Ion-Propelled Gradiometer GOCE must remain in stable free fall at low orbit, so an electric ion propulsion engine constantly provides small bursts of thrusts to counteract any air resistance the craft encounters. ESA - AOES Medialab

From Popular Science:

After six months of testing and very careful calibration, the European Space Agency’s GOCE satellite is sending back its first data sets as it now begins precisely mapping tiny variations in Earth’s magnetic field. How does one go about mapping the Earth’s fundamental force? As it turns out, very, very carefully.

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The Shining: What We Still Have To Learn About The Northern Lights.

A typical Alaskan sky, photographed from Eielson Air Force Base, 25 miles southeast of Fairbanks, displays auroral structures and motions that scientists still find mystifying. (USAF/ Senior Airman Joshua Strang)

From Air & Space Smithsonian:

What first appeared almost an hour ago as a strange green cloud in the northeast has now spread across most of the sky near Alaska’s Poker Flat Research Range. Sheets of green light shimmer in front of the stars, waxing and waning, as electrons from the solar wind rain down through Earth’s atmosphere, colliding with atoms and creating the aurora. Here, watching the light show under a zillion stars, I get a strong, almost physical awareness of being on a planet—a planet orbiting a star and connected to it, despite the 93 million miles of space separating them.

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e-Wolf's e2 Next-Gen EV Supercar a Handsome Powerhouse

e-Wolf's e2 Electric Vehicle: With a top speed of 155 mph and 0-60 acceleration in under four seconds, the e2's performance is nothing to scoff at (for an EV especially). e-Wolf

From Popular Science:

No sooner does Tesla announce that it's expanding its vision to include minivans and crossovers, e-Wolf unveils an EV supercar that’s so sporty we’ve forgotten what Tesla’s Roadster even looks like. With a top speed of 155 miles per hour and a 0-60 acceleration that clocks in under four seconds, it has the performance to (somewhat) match its Italian playboy good looks, and its all-wheel drive (each wheel is powered by an independent electric motor) should be able to keep all 2,000 pounds of it on the road.

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Scientists Develop Nasal Spray That Improves Memory

Good news for procrastinating students: a nasal spray developed by a team of German scientists promises to give late night cram sessions a major boost, if a good night's sleep follows. (Credit: iStockphoto/Ana Blazic)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Oct. 2, 2009) — Good news for procrastinating students: a nasal spray developed by a team of German scientists promises to give late night cram sessions a major boost, if a good night's sleep follows. In a research report featured as the cover story of the October 2009 print issue of The FASEB Journal, these scientists show that a molecule from the body's immune system (interleukin-6) when administered through the nose helps the brain retain emotional and procedural memories during REM sleep.

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Dinosaur-killing Space Rock Barely Rattled Algae

A close-up view of the 40-centimeter-wide Fish Clay boundary layer. Credit: J. Sepúlveda.

From Live Science:

The asteroid impact that many researchers claim was the cause of the dinosaur die-off was bad news for marine life at the time as well. But new research shows that microalgae – one of the primary producers in the ocean – bounced back from the global extinction in about 100 years or less.

Most of the research on the Cretaceous-Paleogene (K-P) extinction event, previously called the Cretaceous-Tertiary (K-T) event, has involved charting the loss of organisms that had bones or shells.

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Sedatives May Slow Recovery From Trauma

Benzodiazepines may not be the answer for soldiers suffering stress from the horrors of war (Image: Sipa Press/Rex Features)

From New Scientist:

GIVING sleeping pills to soldiers and earthquake victims is common practice, yet it could be doing more harm than good. That's the suggestion from a study of traumatised rats, which seemed to show that the drugs suppressed the rodent's natural mechanisms for coping with trauma.

The US Department of Veterans Affairs says it will consider this and other studies when preparing new guidelines on treatments for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). If their results are strong enough, it may recommend withholding sedatives in the aftermath of traumatic events. The findings are also throwing up new possibilities for preventing PTSD (see "Fight stress with stress").

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Nature's Clones: What Twins Have Taught Us

Studies on twins have revealed the genetic nature of many medical conditions, including autism and ADHD. Now they're giving us unnerving insights into many behavioural traits too.Credit: iStockphoto

From Cosmos:

Is it our experiences or our genes that make us who we are? Studying twins has revealed unexpected, and often unnerving, insights into the nature versus nurture debate.

Imagine receiving a phone call out of the blue. You find the voice on the other end eerily familiar as it tells you some life-changing news: you are, in fact, a twin. And when it comes time to meet face-to-face, you find it’s like gazing into a mirror. You share a similar dress sense, hairstyle and even idiosyncratic gestures and expressions you thought were uniquely yours.

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Meeting Pretty Women Makes Men Feel Good

Psychologists found that just a five minute talk with an attractive women raised the levels of testosterone by 14 per cent Photo: GETTY IMAGES

From The Telegraph:

Flirting with an attractive woman really does make men feel good, scientists find, as they discover it causes a surge in health-giving hormones.

Researchers found that just being in the presence of a pretty member of the opposite sex causes a temporary boost in levels of testosterone and cortisol – both hormones associated with alertness and wellbeing.

However hanging around with other men has the opposite affect – reducing the levels of both substances in the body.

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The Secrets Of Ancient Rome

Rose Ferraby from the University of Southampton works on a three-seat communal toilet discovered at the site of the ancient port of the Roman Empire Photograph: Chris Ison/PA

From The Guardian:

The discovery of a major new archaeological site in Italy is a reminder that the world is still stuffed with secrets.

Look down from a height at any landscape in this slanting autumn light, and you'll see that the ground is only a thin blanket thrown over the remains of the past. The faint marks of fields and walls, houses and roads, show up even in the heart of cities – in relics as humble as the outline of a lost Edwardian rose bed, marring the bland green perfection of a suburban lawn.

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Video: The Robot That Can Turn Into A Car

From The Daily Mail:

A Japanese inventor has designed a robot that can change from robot to vehicle in seconds - and can even offer 'piggy-backs' on its shoulders.

Looking a bit like Optimus Prime, the lead character of the Transformers films, the robot is even prepared to battle, especially when it takes exception to sharing the stage with a smaller robot.

The three-foot high creation took part in the Robo-One competition, which aims to drive the creation of humanoid-shaped robots.

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How Aviation Can Come Clean

Image: Flying wing: The Boeing X-48B, an unmanned prototype with a 6.4-meter wingspan, has a blended-wing design that could one day replace that of today's commercial planes. Credit: NASA

From Technology Review:

Advanced technology won't be enough for the industry to meet its own greenhouse-gas targets.

Last week the global aviation industry called on the United Nations to establish a single, worldwide policy for reducing aviation greenhouse-gas emissions, in an attempt to avoid a costly network of regional regulations. The industry proposed two primary goals--that by 2020 it should stop increasing its greenhouse emissions, and that by 2050 it should cut its emissions by 50 percent compared to 2005 levels.

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Students Build The Solar Homes Of The Future

From Popular Mechanics:

For the Solar Decathlon, 20 teams of college students strive to build the most technologically savvy sun-powered house. For two weeks in October their homes go head to head in a contest to consume the least energy.

On a hot and bright California day, the red steel frame of a half-built house, its footprint a jagged stamp on the landscape, glints in the sunshine beaming down on Santa Clara University. Crawling around the crescent-shaped structure, workers holler measurements, fasten sheathing and snap chalk lines. They’re wearing hard hats and tool belts, and the noise of steel swatting plywood sounds unmistakably like a job site. But this is hardly a construction crew out of central casting.

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With Drone Shortage, Air Force Pilots Train With Cessnas Dressed Up Like Predators

Surrogate Predator: A Cessna 182 wears the sensor ball
of a Predator Lon Carlson, L-3 Communications.

From Popular Science:

Converted manned aircraft with mounted sensor balls will imitate Predators and Reapers during military exercises.

A high demand for Predators and Reapers on the front lines has led the U.S. Air Force to take an unusual step: asking human pilots to mimic the drones for training purposes back in the States.

Cessna 182 aircraft have become converted "Surrogate Predators" with the installation of a "Predator ball" that typically serves as the surveillance and tracking eyes for drone operators. Such Predator balls give the manned Cessnas the ability to lock onto targets and track them.

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Uncivilisation: The Dark Mountain Manifesto

From New Statesman:

We have, it seems, led the planet into the age of ecocide. Can civilisation survive the unavoidable environmental catastrophe? To stand a chance we will need cool heads, not fiery dreams.

During the past century empires crashed, new states foundered, utopian projects failed and entire civilisations melted down. Revolutionary change was the norm, as it has been throughout modern times. Yet today many of us assume our present way of life will last for ever, and any suggestion that it may be facing intractable difficulties is dismissed as doom-mongering. The result is that the precariousness of modern civilisation is underestimated and the impression that things can go on indefinitely, much as they do now is touted as hard-headed realism.

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New Ancient Fungus Finding Suggests World's Forests Were Wiped Out In Global Catastrophe

An enlarged image of Reduviasporonites. Scientists believe extinct fungus species capitalised on a world-wide disaster and thrived on early Earth. (Credit: Image courtesy of Imperial College London)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Oct. 2, 2009) — Tiny organisms that covered the planet more than 250 million years ago appear to be a species of ancient fungus that thrived in dead wood, according to new research published October 1 in the journal Geology.

The researchers behind the study, from Imperial College London and other universities in the UK, USA and The Netherlands, believe that the organisms were able to thrive during this period because the world's forests had been wiped out. This would explain how the organisms, which are known as Reduviasporonites, were able to proliferate across the planet.

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Exploring The Mysteries Of The Ocean Floor

The submersible Alvin which Emily Beale and her colleagues used to collect sediment from methane seeps in the Eel River Basin in California. Credit: Emily Beal, Penn State University

From Live Science:

About three years ago, Emily Beal — a graduate student in geosciences at Penn State —eagerly boarded the deep-diving research submersible called Alvin, bound for the bottom of the ocean.

After squeezing into Alvin’s titanium sphere, Beal began her plunge to the ocean floor with more than a tad of claustrophobia. Alvin was just big enough to hold her, the submersible’s pilot, and Penn State colleague Chris House. Fortunately, as Beal peered out of Alvin’s plate-sized portholes during her descent, her claustrophobia quickly gave way to pure, unalloyed exhilaration.

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Health Claim Of Probiotics Not Accepted

From The Independent:

£220m-a-year 'dairy shots' industry in disarray following EU scientists' ruling.

Drink this yogurt for a healthier stomach. Thirty million shoppers have swallowed the claims for probiotics as enthusiastically as the sweet fermented milk in the belief that "good bacteria" will defeat "bad bacteria" in epic microscopic battles inside our bodies.

But claims that probiotic ingredients improve health can not be supported, according to an extensive review of scientific research by a team of experts from the European Union.

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Best Of The Ig Nobel Prizes 2009

Surely there is more than one use for a bra?
(Image: Jessica Peterson/Getty)

From New Scientist:

Why don't pregnant women topple over? Do cows notice kindness? Does cracking your knuckles bring on arthritis? And is there more than one use for a bra? These questions and more inspired the research rewarded at the Ig Nobels, which were handed out on Thursday at Harvard University in a ceremony organised by the Annals of Improbable Research.

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