mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR")
February 2012, issue number 2012-02. ISSN 1076-500X.
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Monthly mini update/alert from the Annals of Improbable Research
This issue is at
<http://www.improbable.com/airchives/miniair/2012/mini2012-02.htm>
Archive at <http://improbable.com/airchives/miniair/>
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2012-02-01 TABLE OF CONTENTS
2012-02-02 Imminent Events
2012-02-03 The Magazine: Body Parts Issue
2012-02-04 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Inaccurate Children
2012-02-05 Ig Nobel in Vancouver (and Beyond)
2012-02-06 Candy / Meal Competition
2012-02-07 Crawler Sandwich Damping Poet
2012-02-08 MORE IMPROBABLE: Cows, Trays, Gasses
2012-02-09 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Fecal Pellet and Chopsticks
2012-02-10 Improbable Research Events
2012-02-11 -- How to Subscribe to the Magazine (*)
2012-02-12 -- Our Address (*)
2012-02-13 -- Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)
2012-02-14 -- How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*)
Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue.
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2012-02-02 Imminent Events
AAAS, Vancouver Feb 18, 2012
UK Tour Mar 8-17, 2012
BITS, Pilani, India Mar 17-18, 2012
Denmark/Sweden Tour Mar 23-28, 2012
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2012-02-03 The Magazine: Body Parts Issue
The special Body Parts issue of the magazine is online at <http://bit.ly/A8iJAv>. It features lots and lots of body parts.
Read back issues online (including the special Ig Nobel issue) and/or subscribe to the fully tangible paper version, at: <http://www.improbable.com/magazine/>.
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2012-02-04 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: Inaccurate Children
This month's research spotlight focuses on children and accuracy:
"Bias in Self-Reported Height and Weight in Preadolescents,"Jan Seghers and Albrecht L. Claessens, Journal of Pediatrics, vol. 157, no. 6, December 2010, pp. 911-16. <http://bit.ly/xdsv8t> (Thanks to R.B. Weitz for bringing this to our attention.) The authors, at Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium, report:
"Self-reported height and weight was administered and then measured in 798 fourth graders age 8 to 11 years.... Children age 8 to 11 years were not able to accurately estimate their actual height and weight, leading to erroneous estimating rates of their weight status."
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2012-02-05 Ig Nobel in Vancouver (and Beyond)
Our annual show at the AAAS Annual Meeting will happen on SATURDAY NIGHT, FEB 18, in VANCOUVER. The show (unlike most of the meeting) is open to the public, free. It will feature:
<> JOHN SENDERS of the University of Toronto, 2011 Ig Nobel public safety prize winner, will do two brief talks — one about his driving-on-a-highway-with-eyes-covered experiment, the other about an unpublished gunslinger experiment he did in 1956
<> YORAM BAUMAN, performing economist.
<> IVAN ORANSKY, co-founder of Retraction Watch, will describe the yearÕs most memorable and provocative retractions
<> SYDNEY FELS of the University of British Columbia will demonstrate how computers can automatically turn a personÕs gestures into speech
and others to be announced.
And next month — March — will be a busy Ig Nobel month, with shows in ENGLAND, SCOTLAND, INDIA, DENMARK and SWEDEN. See the entire schedule at <http://www.improbable.com/improbable-research-shows/complete-schedule/>
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2012-02-06 Candy / Meal Competition
Candy inspires this month's limerick competition. To enter, compose an original limerick that illuminates the nature of this report:
"Meal Order Reversal: Effects of Eating a Sweet Course First or Last," Barbara J. Rolls, Louise J. Laster, Ann Summerfelt, Appetite, vol. 16, no. 2, April 1991, pp. 141-8. <http://bit.ly/waNY0b> The authors, at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, report:
"The aim of the experiment was to determine the effects of eating a sweet food either as a first course or as a third course on intake during a three-course lunch. Twenty normal weight, non-dieting male subjects were run twice in a counter-balanced design. The first and third courses were interchanged and consisted of either a sweet (candy bar) or savory (cheese or crackers) food... there was no indication that eating candy as a first course affected appetite and food intake differently from eating the same amount of a non-sweet food such as cheese on crackers, which was similar in energy density and palatability."
PRIZE: The winning poet will receive (if we manage to send it to the correct address) a free, possibly front-sweetened, hi-res PDF issue of the Annals of Improbable Research. Send your limerick to:
MEAL ORDER REVERSAL / CANDY LIMERICK COMPETITION
c/o <marca@improbable.com>
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2012-02-07 Crawler Sandwich Damping Poet
The judges have chosen a winner in the Crawler Sandwich Damping Limerick Competition, which asked for a limerick to honor the study "Optimization for Sandwich Damping Composite Structure: Used in Sprockets of Crawler Vehicles," Dagang Sun, Xin Zhang, Yong Song, and Bijuan Yan, Journal of Sandwich Structures and Materials, epub December 11, 2011. <http://bit.ly/uuTToc>
Here's the winning limerick, by INVESTIGATOR DON DAVIS:
He said, "I will bet you a dollar,
I can damp the vibes deep in that crawler
With a sandwich I'll show
Of composites placed low
You can trust me for I am a scholar."
Here's the offering from LIMERICK LAUREATE MARTIN EIGER:
How to achieve mitigation,
In crawlers, of sprockets' vibration?
Using x's and betas,
Y's and some etas,
They show us the optimization.
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2012-02-08 MORE IMPROBABLE: Cows, Trays, Gasses
Recent improbable bits you may or may not have missed:
twitter: @ImprobResearch, @IgNobel
facebook: "Improbable Research"
BLOG <http://improbable.com/>
<> Milking merry-go-round (you know, for cows)
<> Greenhouse gasses on about trays
<> FlegrÕs dominance/submissivity/sadomasochism/internet-trap test
<> "The finest piece of plastic-surgeon's porn"
And many more...
NEWSPAPER <http://improbable.com/category/newspaper-column>
<> Pork, the surprise (yet traditional) remedy for a nosebleed
<> Almost-poisoning pigeons in the park
<> Cereals with that patented chameleon quality
And more...
HAIR CLUBS: Kathryn Devaney and Scott Hampton joined the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists (LFHCfS):
<http://www.improbable.com/category/lfhcfs-hair-club/>
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2012-02-09 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Fecal Pellet and Chopsticks
STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS OF A FECAL PELLET
"The Ultrastructure of a Doliolid and a Copepod Fecal Pellet," Marion Kster, Rabea Sietmann, Annette Meuche and Gustav-Adolf Paffenhfer, Journal of Plankton Research, vol. 33, no. 10, 2011, pp. 1538-1549. <http://bit.ly/zdpa6w> (Thanks to Mike Marshall for bringing this to our attention.) The authors are at Ernst-Moritz-Arndt-Universitt Greifswald, Germany.
CHOPSTICKS, MOVING BEANS, PEGBOARD
"Effects Of Prior Use of Chopsticks on Two Different Types of Dexterity Tests: Moving Beans Test and Purdue Pegboard," Sohee Shin, Shinichi Demura, Hiroki Aoki, Perceptual and Motor Skills, vol. 108, April 2009, pp. 392-8. <http://bit.ly/wcvf7S> The authors are at Kanazawa University.
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2012-02-10 Improbable Research Events
For details and additional events, see
<http://improbable.com/improbable-research-shows/complete-schedule>
AAAS, Vancouver, Canada - Feb 18, 2012
Ig Nobel UK Tour — Mar 8-17, 2012
BITS, Pilani, India — Mar 17-18, 2012
Ig Nobel Tour of Scandinavia — Mar 23-28, 2012
Washington U, St. Louis — Apr 4, 2012
Cambridge (MA) Sci Fest — Apr 26, 2012
Korea — May 2012
The Netherlands — Jun 2012
Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony — Sep 20, 2012
Ig Informal Lectures — Sep 22, 2012
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2012-02-11 -- How to Subscribe to the Magazine (*)
The Annals of Improbable Research is a 6-issues-per-year magazine. (It's much bigger, and maybe better, than the little bits of overflow material you've been reading in this newsletter.)
To subscribe to the paper-and-ink version, go to <http://improbable.com/subscribe/> or send in this form:
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2012-02-12 -- Our Address (*)
Annals of Improbable Research (AIR)
PO Box 380853, Cambridge, MA 02238 USA
617-491-4437 FAX:617-661-0927
EDITORIAL: marca@improbable.com
SUBSCRIPTIONS: subscriptions@improbable.com
Web Site: <http://www.improbable.com>
Blog: <http://www.improbable.com>
Twitter: ImprobResearch
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2012-02-13 -- Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)
Please distribute copies of mini-AIR (or excerpts!) wherever appropriate. The only limitations are: A) Please indicate that the material comes from mini-AIR. B) You may NOT distribute mini-AIR for commercial purposes.
------------- mini-AIRheads -------------
EDITOR: Marc Abrahams
MINI-PROOFREADER AND PICKER OF NITS (before we introduce the last
few at the last moment): Wendy Mattson
CO-CONSPIRATORS: Kees Moeliker, Alice Shirrell Kaswell, Gary Dryfoos, Ernest Ersatz, Stephen Drew
MAITRE DE COMPUTATION: Jerry Lotto
AUTHORITY FIGURES: Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach, Sheldon Glashow, Richard Roberts
Key words: improbable research, science humor, Ig Nobel, AIR, the
(c) copyright 2012, Annals of Improbable Research
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2012-02-14 -- How to Receive mini-AIR, etc. (*)
Mini-AIR is a (free!) tiny monthly *supplement* to the bi-monthly print magazine AIR.
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