List of Ig Nobel Prize winners
Encyclopedia
This is a list of Ig Nobel Prize
Ig Nobel Prize
The Ig Nobel Prizes are an American parody of the Nobel Prizes and are given each year in early October for ten unusual or trivial achievements in scientific research. The stated aim of the prizes is to "first make people laugh, and then make them think"...

 winners
from 1991 to the present day.

A parody
Parody
A parody , in current usage, is an imitative work created to mock, comment on, or trivialise an original work, its subject, author, style, or some other target, by means of humorous, satiric or ironic imitation...

 of the Nobel Prize
Nobel Prize
The Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...

s, the Ig Nobel Prizes are given each year in early October—around the time the recipients of the genuine Nobel Prizes are announced—for ten achievements that "first make people laugh, and then make them think." Commenting on the 2006 awards, Marc Abrahams, editor of Annals of Improbable Research
Annals of Improbable Research
The Annals of Improbable Research is a bi-monthly magazine devoted to scientific humor, in the form of a satirical take on the standard academic journal...

, co-sponsor of the awards, said: "The prizes are intended to celebrate the unusual, honour the imaginative – and spur people's interest in science, medicine and technology." All prizes are awarded for real achievements (except for three in 1991 and one in 1994 due to an erroneous press release).

1991

  • BiologyRobert Klark Graham
    Robert Klark Graham
    Robert Klark Graham was born in Harbor Springs, Michigan, USA. He was a eugenicist and businessman who made millions by developing shatter-proof plastic eyeglass lenses, and who later founded the Repository for Germinal Choice, a sperm bank for geniuses in the hope of implementing a eugenics...

    , selector of seeds and prophet of propagation, for his pioneering development of the Repository for Germinal Choice
    Repository for Germinal Choice
    The Repository for Germinal Choice was a sperm bank that existed in Escondido, California from 1980 to 1999. The repository is commonly believed to have accepted only donations from Nobel Prize laureates, although in fact it accepted donations from non-Nobelists, also...

    , a sperm bank that accepts donations only from Nobellians and Olympians
    Olympic Games
    The Olympic Games is a major international event featuring summer and winter sports, in which thousands of athletes participate in a variety of competitions. The Olympic Games have come to be regarded as the world’s foremost sports competition where more than 200 nations participate...

    .
  • ChemistryJacques Benveniste
    Jacques Benveniste
    Jacques Benveniste was a French immunologist. In 1979 he published a well-known paper on the structure of platelet-activating factor and its relationship with histamine...

    , prolific proselytizer and dedicated correspondent of Nature
    Nature (journal)
    Nature, first published on 4 November 1869, is ranked the world's most cited interdisciplinary scientific journal by the Science Edition of the 2010 Journal Citation Reports...

    ,
    for his persistent discovery that water, H2O, is an intelligent liquid, and for demonstrating to his satisfaction that water is able to remember events long after all traces of those events have vanished (see water memory
    Water memory
    Water memory is the claimed ability of water to retain a "memory" of substances previously dissolved in it to arbitrary dilution. No scientific evidence supports this claim. Shaking the water at each stage of a serial dilution is claimed to be necessary for an effect to occur...

    , his proposed explanation for homeopathy
    Homeopathy
    Homeopathy is a form of alternative medicine in which practitioners claim to treat patients using highly diluted preparations that are believed to cause healthy people to exhibit symptoms that are similar to those exhibited by the patient...

    ).
  • EconomicsMichael Milken
    Michael Milken
    Michael Robert Milken is an American business magnate, financier, and philanthropist noted for his role in the development of the market for high-yield bonds during the 1970s and 1980s, for his 1990 guilty plea to felony charges for violating US securities laws, and for his funding of medical...

    , titan of Wall Street and father of the junk bond, to whom the world is indebted.
  • EducationJ. Danforth Quayle
    Dan Quayle
    James Danforth "Dan" Quayle served as the 44th Vice President of the United States, serving with President George H. W. Bush . He served as a U.S. Representative and U.S. Senator from the state of Indiana....

    , consumer of time and occupier of space (as well as the U.S. Vice President from 1989–93), for demonstrating, better than anyone else, the need for science education.
  • LiteratureErich von Däniken
    Erich von Däniken
    Erich Anton Paul von Däniken is a Swiss author best known for his controversial claims about extraterrestrial influences on early human culture, in books such as Chariots of the Gods?, published in 1968...

    , visionary raconteur and author of Chariots of the Gods?, for explaining how human civilization was influenced by ancient astronauts
    Ancient astronauts
    Some writers have proposed that intelligent extraterrestrial beings have visited Earth in antiquity or prehistory and made contact with humans. Such visitors are called ancient astronauts or ancient aliens. Proponents suggest that this contact influenced the development of human cultures,...

     from outer space.
  • Medicine – Alan Kligerman, deviser of digestive deliverance, vanquisher of vapor, and inventor of Beano
    Beano (dietary supplement)
    Beano is an enzyme-based dietary supplement that is used to reduce gas in the digestive tract, thereby improving digestion and reducing bloating, discomfort, and flatulence caused by gas. It contains the enzyme alpha galactosidase that breaks down oligosaccharides such as raffinose...

    , for his pioneering work with anti-gas liquids that prevent bloat, gassiness, discomfort and embarrassment.
  • PeaceEdward Teller
    Edward Teller
    Edward Teller was a Hungarian-American theoretical physicist, known colloquially as "the father of the hydrogen bomb," even though he did not care for the title. Teller made numerous contributions to nuclear and molecular physics, spectroscopy , and surface physics...

    , father of the hydrogen bomb and first champion of the Star Wars weapons system
    Strategic Defense Initiative
    The Strategic Defense Initiative was proposed by U.S. President Ronald Reagan on March 23, 1983 to use ground and space-based systems to protect the United States from attack by strategic nuclear ballistic missiles. The initiative focused on strategic defense rather than the prior strategic...

    , for his lifelong efforts to change the meaning of peace as we know it.

Apocryphal achievements

The first nomination also featured three fictional recipients for fictional achievements.
  • Interdisciplinary research: Josiah S. Carberry
    Josiah S. Carberry
    Josiah Stinkney Carberry is a fictional professor, created as a joke. He is said to have taught at Brown University, and to be known for his work in "psychoceramics", the supposed study of "cracked pots".-History:...

    , for his work in psychoceramics, the study of "cracked pots."
  • Pedestrian technology: Paul DeFanti
    Paul DeFanti
    Paul DeFanti is the fictional recipient of the 1991 Ig Nobel Prize in the area of Pedestrian Technology "for his invention of the Buckybonnet, a geodesic fashion structure that pedestrians wear to protect their heads and preserve their composure." This makes him one of only three fictional people...

    , "wizard of structures and crusader for public safety, for his invention of the Buckybonnet, a geodesic
    Geodesic
    In mathematics, a geodesic is a generalization of the notion of a "straight line" to "curved spaces". In the presence of a Riemannian metric, geodesics are defined to be the shortest path between points in the space...

     fashion structure that pedestrians wear to protect their heads and preserve their composure".
  • Physics: Thomas Kyle, for his discovery of "the heaviest element in the universe, Administratium
    Administratium
    Administratium is a well-known joke in scientific circles, and is a spoof both on the bureaucracy of scientific establishments and on descriptions of newly discovered chemical elements....

    ".

1992

  • Archaeology – Eclaireurs de France (a French Scouting organization), removers of graffiti
    Graffiti
    Graffiti is the name for images or lettering scratched, scrawled, painted or marked in any manner on property....

    , for damaging the prehistoric paintings of two Bison
    Bison
    Members of the genus Bison are large, even-toed ungulates within the subfamily Bovinae. Two extant and four extinct species are recognized...

    s in the Cave of Mayrière supérieure near the French village of Bruniquel
    Bruniquel
    Bruniquel is a commune in the Tarn-et-Garonne department in the Midi-Pyrénées region in southern France.-Geography:The tiny fortified village of 561 inhabitants is at an altitude of 250 metres by the river Aveyron....

    .
  • Art – Presented jointly to Jim Knowlton, modern Renaissance man
    Polymath
    A polymath is a person whose expertise spans a significant number of different subject areas. In less formal terms, a polymath may simply be someone who is very knowledgeable...

    , for his classic anatomy poster "Penises of the Animal Kingdom," and to the U.S. National Endowment for the Arts
    National Endowment for the Arts
    The National Endowment for the Arts is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created by an act of the U.S. Congress in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal government. Its current...

    , for encouraging Mr. Knowlton to extend his work in the form of a pop-up book.
  • BiologyDr. Cecil Jacobson
    Cecil Jacobson
    Cecil Byran Jacobson is a former fertility doctor who used his own sperm to impregnate his patients, without informing them.-Baboon impregnation:...

    , relentlessly generous sperm donor, and prolific patriarch of sperm banking, for devising a simple, single-handed method of quality control.
  • Chemistry – Ivette Bassa, constructor of colourful colloid
    Colloid
    A colloid is a substance microscopically dispersed evenly throughout another substance.A colloidal system consists of two separate phases: a dispersed phase and a continuous phase . A colloidal system may be solid, liquid, or gaseous.Many familiar substances are colloids, as shown in the chart below...

    s, for her role in the crowning achievement of twentieth century chemistry, the synthesis of bright blue Jell-O
    Jell-O
    Jell-O is a brand name belonging to U.S.-based Kraft Foods for a number of gelatin desserts, including fruit gels, puddings and no-bake cream pies. The brand's popularity has led to it being used as a generic term for gelatin dessert across the U.S. and Canada....

    .
  • Economics – The investors of Lloyd's of London
    Lloyd's of London
    Lloyd's, also known as Lloyd's of London, is a British insurance and reinsurance market. It serves as a partially mutualised marketplace where multiple financial backers, underwriters, or members, whether individuals or corporations, come together to pool and spread risk...

    , heirs to 300 years of dull prudent management, for their bold attempt to ensure disaster by refusing to pay for their company's losses.
  • Literature

Yuri Struchkov, unstoppable author from the Institute of Organoelement Compounds in Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

, for the 948 scientific papers he published between the years 1981 and 1990, averaging more than one every 3.9 days.
  • Medicine – F. Kanda, E. Yagi, M. Fukuda, K. Nakajima, T. Ohta, and O. Nakata of the Shiseido
    Shiseido
    is a major Japanese hair care and cosmetics producer. It is the oldest cosmetics company in the world and the fourth largest cosmetics company in the world.-History:...

     Research Center in Yokohama
    Yokohama
    is the capital city of Kanagawa Prefecture and the second largest city in Japan by population after Tokyo and most populous municipality of Japan. It lies on Tokyo Bay, south of Tokyo, in the Kantō region of the main island of Honshu...

    , for their pioneering research study "Elucidation of Chemical Compounds Responsible for Foot Malodour," especially for their conclusion that people who think they have foot odor
    Foot odor
    Foot odor is a type of body odor that affects the feet of humans and is generally considered to be an unpleasant smell.-Cause:...

     do, and those who don't, don't.
  • Nutrition – The utilizers of SPAM
    Spam (food)
    Spam is a canned precooked meat product made by the Hormel Foods Corporation, first introduced in 1937. The labeled ingredients in the classic variety of Spam are chopped pork shoulder meat, with ham meat added, salt, water, modified potato starch as a binder, and sodium nitrite as a preservative...

    , courageous consumers of canned comestibles, for 54 years of undiscriminating digestion.
  • PeaceDaryl Gates
    Daryl Gates
    Daryl Gates was the Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department from 1978 to 1992.-Early life:...

    , former police chief of the City of Los Angeles
    Los Ángeles
    Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...

    , for his uniquely compelling methods of bringing people together
    1992 Los Angeles riots
    The 1992 Los Angeles Riots or South Central Riots, also known as the 1992 Los Angeles Civil Unrest were sparked on April 29, 1992, when a jury acquitted three white and one hispanic Los Angeles Police Department officers accused in the videotaped beating of black motorist Rodney King following a...

    .
  • Physics – David Chorley and Doug Bower, lions of low-energy physics, for their circular contributions to field theory based on the geometrical destruction of English crops
    Crop circle
    A crop circle is a sizable pattern created by the flattening of a crop such as wheat, barley, rye, maize, or rapeseed. Crop circles are also referred to as crop formations, because they are not always circular in shape. While the exact date crop circles began to appear is unknown, the documented...

    .

1993

  • Biology – Presented jointly to Paul Williams Jr. of the Oregon State Health Division and Kenneth W. Newel of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, bold biological detectives, for their pioneering study, "Salmonella Excretion in Joy-Riding Pigs".
  • Chemistry – Presented jointly to James Campbell and Gaines Campbell of Lookout Mountain, Tennessee
    Lookout Mountain, Tennessee
    Lookout Mountain is a town in Hamilton County, Tennessee, United States. The population was 1,832 at the 2010 census. It is part of the Chattanooga, TN–GA Metropolitan Statistical Area.-Geography:Lookout Mountain is located at...

    , dedicated deliverers of fragrance, for inventing scent strips, the odious method by which perfume is applied to magazine
    Magazine
    Magazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of articles. They are generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions, or all three...

     pages.
  • Consumer Engineering – Presented to Ron Popeil
    Ron Popeil
    Ronald M. Popeil is an American inventor and marketing personality, best known for his direct response marketing company Ronco...

    , incessant inventor and perpetual pitchman of late night television, for redefining the industrial revolution with such devices as the Veg-O-Matic
    Veg-O-Matic
    Veg-O-Matic was the name of one of the first food-processing appliances to gain widespread use in the United States. It was invented by Samuel J...

    , the Pocket Fisherman, Mr. Microphone, and the Inside-the-Shell Egg Scrambler.
  • Economics – Presented to Ravi Batra
    Ravi Batra
    Raveendra Nath "Ravi" Batra is an Indian-American economist, author, and professor at Southern Methodist University. Batra is the author of six international bestsellers, two of which appeared on The New York Times Best Seller list...

     of Southern Methodist University
    Southern Methodist University
    Southern Methodist University is a private university in Dallas, Texas, United States. Founded in 1911 by the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, SMU operates campuses in Dallas, Plano, and Taos, New Mexico. SMU is owned by the South Central Jurisdiction of the United Methodist Church...

    , shrewd economist and best-selling author of The Great Depression of 1990 (ISBN 978-0-440-20168-7) and Surviving the Great Depression of 1990, (ISBN 978-0-671-66324-7) for selling enough copies of his books to single-handedly prevent worldwide economic collapse
    Depression (economics)
    In economics, a depression is a sustained, long-term downturn in economic activity in one or more economies. It is a more severe downturn than a recession, which is seen by some economists as part of the modern business cycle....

    .
  • Literature – Presented to T. Morrison,E. Topol, R. Califf, F. Van de Werf, P. W. Armstrong, and their 972 co-authors, for publishing a medical research paper which has one hundred times as many authors as pages. The authors are from the following countries: Australia
    Australia
    Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

    , Belgium
    Belgium
    Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

    , Canada
    Canada
    Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

    , France
    France
    The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

    , Germany
    Germany
    Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

    , Ireland
    Republic of Ireland
    Ireland , described as the Republic of Ireland , is a sovereign state in Europe occupying approximately five-sixths of the island of the same name. Its capital is Dublin. Ireland, which had a population of 4.58 million in 2011, is a constitutional republic governed as a parliamentary democracy,...

    , Israel
    Israel
    The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

    , Luxembourg
    Luxembourg
    Luxembourg , officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg , is a landlocked country in western Europe, bordered by Belgium, France, and Germany. It has two principal regions: the Oesling in the North as part of the Ardennes massif, and the Gutland in the south...

    , the Netherlands
    Netherlands
    The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

    , New Zealand
    New Zealand
    New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

    , Poland
    Poland
    Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

    , Spain
    Spain
    Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

    , Switzerland
    Switzerland
    Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

    , the United Kingdom
    United Kingdom
    The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

    , and the United States
    United States
    The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

    .
  • Mathematics – Presented to Robert W. Faid
    Robert W. Faid
    Robert W. Faid was an American author, numerologist and former nuclear engineer from Greenville, South Carolina. He held a master's degree in theology from Coatesville Bible College...

     of Greenville, South Carolina
    Greenville, South Carolina
    -Law and government:The city of Greenville adopted the Council-Manager form of municipal government in 1976.-History:The area was part of the Cherokee Nation's protected grounds after the Treaty of 1763, which ended the French and Indian War. No White man was allowed to enter, though some families...

    , farsighted and faithful seer of statistics, for calculating the exact odds (710,609,175,188,282,000 to 1) that Mikhail Gorbachev
    Mikhail Gorbachev
    Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev is a former Soviet statesman, having served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until 1991, and as the last head of state of the USSR, having served from 1988 until its dissolution in 1991...

     is the Antichrist
    Antichrist
    The term or title antichrist, in Christian theology, refers to a leader who fulfills Biblical prophecies concerning an adversary of Christ, while resembling him in a deceptive manner...

    .
  • Medicine – Presented to James F. Nolan, Thomas J. Stillwell, and John P. Sands, Jr., medical men of mercy, for their painstaking research report, "Acute Management of the Zipper-Entrapped Penis".
  • Peace – The Pepsi-Cola Company of the Philippines, for sponsoring a contest to create a millionaire
    Millionaire
    A millionaire is an individual whose net worth or wealth is equal to or exceeds one million units of currency. It can also be a person who owns one million units of currency in a bank account or savings account...

    , and then announcing the wrong winning number, thereby inciting and uniting 800,000 riotously expectant winners, and bringing many warring factions together for the first time in their nation's history.
  • Physics – Presented to Corentin Louis Kervran
    Corentin Louis Kervran
    Corentin Louis Kervran was a French scientist best known for his defense of the unconventional belief in biological transmutation. In WWII he was part of the French Resistance...

     of France, ardent admirer of alchemy
    Alchemy
    Alchemy is an influential philosophical tradition whose early practitioners’ claims to profound powers were known from antiquity. The defining objectives of alchemy are varied; these include the creation of the fabled philosopher's stone possessing powers including the capability of turning base...

    , for his conclusion that the calcium in chickens' eggshells is created by a process of cold fusion
    Cold fusion
    Cold fusion, also called low-energy nuclear reaction , refers to the hypothesis that nuclear fusion might explain the results of a group of experiments conducted at ordinary temperatures . Both the experimental results and the hypothesis are disputed...

    .
  • Psychology – Presented jointly to John Edward Mack
    John Edward Mack
    John Edward Mack, M.D. was an American psychiatrist, writer, and professor at Harvard Medical School...

     of Harvard Medical School
    Harvard Medical School
    Harvard Medical School is the graduate medical school of Harvard University. It is located in the Longwood Medical Area of the Mission Hill neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts....

     and David M. Jacobs of Temple University
    Temple University
    Temple University is a comprehensive public research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Originally founded in 1884 by Dr. Russell Conwell, Temple University is among the nation's largest providers of professional education and prepares the largest body of professional...

    , for their conclusion that people who believe they were kidnapped by aliens from outer space
    Abduction phenomenon
    The terms alien abduction or abduction phenomenon describe "subjectively real memories of being taken secretly against one’s will by apparently nonhuman entities and subjected to complex physical and psychological procedures." People claiming to have been abducted are usually called "abductees" or...

    , probably were—and especially for their conclusion, "the focus of the abduction is the production of children".
  • Visionary Technology – Presented jointly to Jay Schiffman of Farmington Hills, Michigan
    Farmington Hills, Michigan
    Farmington Hills is a community in southeastern Michigan. It is the largest city in Oakland County in the U.S. state of Michigan. Its population was 79,740 at the 2010 census...

    , crack inventor of AutoVision, an image projection device that makes it possible to drive a car
    Automobile
    An automobile, autocar, motor car or car is a wheeled motor vehicle used for transporting passengers, which also carries its own engine or motor...

     and watch television
    Television
    Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...

     at the same time, and to the Michigan State Legislature, for making it legal to do so.

1994

  • Biology – Presented to W. Brian Sweeney, Brian Krafte-Jacobs, Jeffrey W. Britton, and Wayne Hansen, for their breakthrough study, "The Constipated Serviceman: Prevalence Among Deployed US Troops," and especially for their numerical analysis of bowel movement frequency.
  • Chemistry – Presented to Texas State Senator Bob Glasgow
    Bob Glasgow
    Bob Glasgow is an American politician who held office as a member of the Senate of Texas representing the Democratic Party. Glasgow is trained as a lawyer. He was the winner of the 1994 Ig Nobel Prize in Chemistry for sponsoring a 1989 drug law that made it illegal to buy laboratory glassware...

    , wise writer of logical legislation, for sponsoring the 1989 drug control law which makes it illegal to purchase beakers
    Beaker (glassware)
    A beaker is a simple container for stirring, mixing and heating liquids commonly used in many laboratories. Beakers are generally cylindrical in shape, with a flat bottom. Most also have a small spout to aid pouring as shown in the picture...

    , flasks
    Laboratory flask
    Laboratory flasks are vessels which fall into the category of laboratory equipment known as glassware. In laboratory and other scientific settings, they are usually referred to simply as flasks...

    , test tube
    Test tube
    A test tube, also known as a culture tube or sample tube, is a common piece of laboratory glassware consisting of a finger-like length of glass or clear plastic tubing, open at the top, usually with a rounded U-shaped bottom....

    s, or other laboratory glassware
    Laboratory glassware
    Laboratory glassware refers to a variety of equipment, traditionally made of glass, used for scientific experiments and other work in science, especially in chemistry and biology laboratories...

     without a permit.
  • Economics – Presented to Juan Pablo Dávila of Chile
    Chile
    Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

    , tireless trader of financial futures and former employee of the state-owned company Codelco
    Codelco
    CODELCO is the Chilean state owned copper mining company formed in 1976 from the foreign owned copper companies that were nationalised in 1971. The headquarters are in Santiago and the seven-man board of directors is appointed by the President of the Republic...

    , for instructing his computer
    Computer
    A computer is a programmable machine designed to sequentially and automatically carry out a sequence of arithmetic or logical operations. The particular sequence of operations can be changed readily, allowing the computer to solve more than one kind of problem...

     to "buy" when he meant "sell". He subsequently attempted to recoup his losses by making increasingly unprofitable trades that ultimately lost 0.5 percent of Chile's gross national product. Davila's relentless achievement inspired his countrymen to coin a new verb, "davilar", meaning "to botch things up royally".
  • Entomology – Presented to Robert A. Lopez of Westport, NY, valiant veterinarian
    Veterinarian
    A veterinary physician, colloquially called a vet, shortened from veterinarian or veterinary surgeon , is a professional who treats disease, disorder and injury in animals....

     and friend of all creatures great and small, for his series of experiments in obtaining ear mites from cat
    Cat
    The cat , also known as the domestic cat or housecat to distinguish it from other felids and felines, is a small, usually furry, domesticated, carnivorous mammal that is valued by humans for its companionship and for its ability to hunt vermin and household pests...

    s, inserting them into his own ear, and carefully observing and analyzing the results.
  • Literature – Presented to L. Ron Hubbard
    L. Ron Hubbard
    Lafayette Ronald Hubbard , better known as L. Ron Hubbard , was an American pulp fiction author and religious leader who founded the Church of Scientology...

    , ardent author
    Author
    An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

     of science fiction
    Science fiction
    Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

     and founding father of Scientology
    Scientology
    Scientology is a body of beliefs and related practices created by science fiction and fantasy author L. Ron Hubbard , starting in 1952, as a successor to his earlier self-help system, Dianetics...

    , for his crackling Good Book, Dianetics
    Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health
    Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health is a book by L. Ron Hubbard which sets out self-improvement techniques he developed, called Dianetics. The book is also one of the canonical texts of Scientology. It is colloquially referred to as Book One...

    , which is highly profitable to mankind, or to a portion thereof.
  • Mathematics – Presented to The Southern Baptist
    Southern Baptist Convention
    The Southern Baptist Convention is a United States-based Christian denomination. It is the world's largest Baptist denomination and the largest Protestant body in the United States, with over 16 million members...

     Church of Alabama
    Alabama
    Alabama is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Tennessee to the north, Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico to the south, and Mississippi to the west. Alabama ranks 30th in total land area and ranks second in the size of its inland...

    , mathematical measurers of morality
    Morality
    Morality is the differentiation among intentions, decisions, and actions between those that are good and bad . A moral code is a system of morality and a moral is any one practice or teaching within a moral code...

    , for their county-by-county estimate of how many Alabama citizens will go to Hell
    Hell
    In many religious traditions, a hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hells as endless. Religions with a cyclic history often depict a hell as an intermediary period between incarnations...

     if they don't repent.
  • Medicine – Two prizes. First, to Patient X, formerly of the US Marine Corps, valiant victim of a venomous bite from his pet rattlesnake
    Rattlesnake
    Rattlesnakes are a group of venomous snakes of the genera Crotalus and Sistrurus of the subfamily Crotalinae . There are 32 known species of rattlesnake, with between 65-70 subspecies, all native to the Americas, ranging from southern Alberta and southern British Columbia in Canada to Central...

    , for his determined use of electroshock therapy. At his own insistence, automobile spark plug
    Spark plug
    A spark plug is an electrical device that fits into the cylinder head of some internal combustion engines and ignites compressed fuels such as aerosol, gasoline, ethanol, and liquefied petroleum gas by means of an electric spark.Spark plugs have an insulated central electrode which is connected by...

     wires were attached to his lip, and the car engine revved to 3,000 rpm for five minutes. Second, to Dr. Richard C. Dart of the Rocky Mountain Poison Center and Dr. Richard A. Gustafson of The University of Arizona
    University of Arizona
    The University of Arizona is a land-grant and space-grant public institution of higher education and research located in Tucson, Arizona, United States. The University of Arizona was the first university in the state of Arizona, founded in 1885...

     Health Sciences Center, for their well-grounded medical report, "Failure of Electric Shock Treatment for Rattlesnake Envenomation."
  • Peace – Presented to John Hagelin
    John Hagelin
    John Samuel Hagelin is an American particle physicist, three-time candidate of the Natural Law Party for President of the United States , and the director of the Transcendental Meditation movement for the US....

     of Maharishi University
    Maharishi University of Management
    Maharishi University of Management , formerly known as Maharishi International University, is a non-profit, American university, located in Fairfield, Iowa. It was founded in 1973 by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and features a "consciousness-based education" system that includes the practice of the...

     and The Institute of Science, Technology and Public Policy, for his experimental conclusion that 4,000 trained meditators caused an 18 percent decrease in violent crime in Washington, D.C.
    Washington, D.C.
    Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

    .
  • Psychology – Presented to Lee Kuan Yew
    Lee Kuan Yew
    Lee Kuan Yew, GCMG, CH is a Singaporean statesman. He was the first Prime Minister of the Republic of Singapore, governing for three decades...

    , former Prime Minister of Singapore
    Prime Minister of Singapore
    The Prime Minister of the Republic of Singapore is the head of the government of the Republic of Singapore. The President of Singapore appoints as Prime Minister a Member of Parliament who, in his opinion, is most likely to command the confidence of a majority of MPs.The office of Prime Minister...

    , for his thirty-year study of the effects of punishing three million citizens of Singapore
    Singapore
    Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...

     whenever they spat, chewed gum, or fed pigeons.

Apocryphal achievements, no longer officially listed

  • Physics – Presented to The Japanese Meteorological Agency, for its seven-year study of whether earthquakes are caused by catfish
    Catfish
    Catfishes are a diverse group of ray-finned fish. Named for their prominent barbels, which resemble a cat's whiskers, catfish range in size and behavior from the heaviest and longest, the Mekong giant catfish from Southeast Asia and the second longest, the wels catfish of Eurasia, to detritivores...

     wiggling their tails. This winner is not officially listed, as it was based on what turned out to be erroneous press accounts.

1995

  • Chemistry – Presented to Bijan Pakzad of Beverly Hills, for creating DNA Cologne and DNA Perfume, neither of which contain deoxyribonucleic acid, and both of which come in a triple helix bottle.
  • Dentistry – Presented to Robert H. Beaumont, of Shoreview, Minnesota
    Shoreview, Minnesota
    As of the census of 2000, there are 25,377 people, Males: 12,303 , Females: 13,074 , 9,965 households, and 7,021 families residing in the city. The population density is 2,315.9 people per square mile . There are 10,127 housing units at an average density of 919.2 per square mile...

    , for his incisive study "Patient Preference for Waxed or Unwaxed Dental Floss."
  • Economics – Presented jointly to Nick Leeson
    Nick Leeson
    Nicholas "Nick" Leeson is a former derivatives broker whose fraudulent, unauthorized speculative trading caused the collapse of Barings Bank, the United Kingdom's oldest investment bank, for which he was sent to prison...

     and his superiors at Barings Bank
    Barings Bank
    Barings Bank was the oldest merchant bank in London until its collapse in 1995 after one of the bank's employees, Nick Leeson, lost £827 million due to speculative investing, primarily in futures contracts, at the bank's Singapore office.-History:-1762–1890:Barings Bank was founded in 1762 as the...

     and to Robert Citron
    Robert Citron
    Robert Lafee Citron is a Democratic Party politician who was the longtime Treasurer-Tax Collector of Orange County, California, when it declared Chapter 9 bankruptcy on December 6, 1994. Citron was the only Democrat to hold office in otherwise Conservative/Republican Orange County at the time...

     of Orange County, California
    Orange County, California
    Orange County is a county in the U.S. state of California. Its county seat is Santa Ana. As of the 2010 census, its population was 3,010,232, up from 2,846,293 at the 2000 census, making it the third most populous county in California, behind Los Angeles County and San Diego County...

     for using the calculus
    Calculus
    Calculus is a branch of mathematics focused on limits, functions, derivatives, integrals, and infinite series. This subject constitutes a major part of modern mathematics education. It has two major branches, differential calculus and integral calculus, which are related by the fundamental theorem...

     of derivatives
    Derivative (finance)
    A derivative instrument is a contract between two parties that specifies conditions—in particular, dates and the resulting values of the underlying variables—under which payments, or payoffs, are to be made between the parties.Under U.S...

     to demonstrate that every financial institution has its limits.
  • Literature – Presented to David B. Busch and James R. Starling, of Madison, Wisconsin
    Madison, Wisconsin
    Madison is the capital of the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Dane County. It is also home to the University of Wisconsin–Madison....

    , for their research report, "Rectal Foreign Bodies
    Rectal foreign body
    Rectal foreign bodies are large foreign items found in the rectum that can be assumed to have been inserted through the anus, rather than reaching the rectum via the mouth and gastrointestinal tract...

    : Case Reports and a Comprehensive Review of the World's Literature." The citations include reports of, among other items: seven light bulbs; a knife sharpener; two flashlight
    Flashlight
    A flashlight is a hand-held electric-powered light source. Usually the light source is a small incandescent lightbulb or light-emitting diode...

    s; a wire spring; a snuff box; an oil can with potato
    Potato
    The potato is a starchy, tuberous crop from the perennial Solanum tuberosum of the Solanaceae family . The word potato may refer to the plant itself as well as the edible tuber. In the region of the Andes, there are some other closely related cultivated potato species...

     stopper; eleven different forms of fruits, vegetables and other foodstuffs; a jeweler's saw; a frozen pig
    Pig
    A pig is any of the animals in the genus Sus, within the Suidae family of even-toed ungulates. Pigs include the domestic pig, its ancestor the wild boar, and several other wild relatives...

    's tail; a tin cup; a beer
    Beer
    Beer is the world's most widely consumed andprobably oldest alcoholic beverage; it is the third most popular drink overall, after water and tea. It is produced by the brewing and fermentation of sugars, mainly derived from malted cereal grains, most commonly malted barley and malted wheat...

     glass; and one patient's remarkable ensemble collection consisting of spectacles, a suitcase
    Suitcase
    A suitcase is a general term for a distinguishable form of luggage. It is often a somewhat flat, rectangular-shaped bag with rounded/square corners, either metal, hard plastic or made of cloth, vinyl or leather that more or less keeps its shape. It has a carrying handle on one side and is used...

     key, a tobacco
    Tobacco
    Tobacco is an agricultural product processed from the leaves of plants in the genus Nicotiana. It can be consumed, used as a pesticide and, in the form of nicotine tartrate, used in some medicines...

     pouch and a magazine
    Magazine
    Magazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of articles. They are generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions, or all three...

    .
  • Medicine – Presented to Marcia E. Buebel, David S. Shannahoff-Khalsa, and Michael R. Boyle, for their study entitled "The Effects of Unilateral Forced Nostril Breathing on Cognition."
  • Nutrition – Presented to John Martinez of J. Martinez & Company in Atlanta, for Luak Coffee
    Kopi Luwak
    Kopi luwak , or civet coffee, is one of the world's most expensive and low-production varieties of coffee. It is made from the beans of coffee berries which have been eaten by the Asian Palm Civet and other related civets, then passed through its digestive tract. A civet eats the berries for their...

    , the world's most expensive coffee
    Coffee
    Coffee is a brewed beverage with a dark,init brooo acidic flavor prepared from the roasted seeds of the coffee plant, colloquially called coffee beans. The beans are found in coffee cherries, which grow on trees cultivated in over 70 countries, primarily in equatorial Latin America, Southeast Asia,...

    , which is made from coffee beans ingested and excreted by the luak, a bobcat-like animal native to Indonesia
    Indonesia
    Indonesia , officially the Republic of Indonesia , is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 13,000 islands. It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people, and is the world's fourth most populous country. Indonesia is a republic, with an...

    .
  • Peace – Presented to the Taiwan National Parliament
    Legislative Yuan
    The Legislative Yuan is the unicameral legislature of the Republic of China .The Legislative Yuan is one of the five branches of government stipulated by the Constitution of the Republic of China, which follows Sun Yat-sen's Three Principles of the People...

    , for demonstrating that politicians gain more by punching, kicking and gouging each other than by waging war against other nations.
  • Physics – Presented to Dominique M.R. Georget, R. Parker, and Andrew C. Smith of Norwich, England, for their rigorous analysis of soggy breakfast cereal
    Breakfast cereal
    A breakfast cereal is a food made from processed grains that is often, but not always, eaten with the first meal of the day. It is often eaten cold, usually mixed with milk , water, or yogurt, and sometimes fruit but sometimes eaten dry. Some cereals, such as oatmeal, may be served hot as porridge...

    . It was published in the report entitled "A Study of the Effects of Water Content on the Compaction Behaviour of Breakfast Cereal Flakes."
  • Psychology – Presented to Shigeru Watanabe, Junko Sakamoto, and Masumi Wakita, of Keio University
    Keio University
    ,abbreviated as Keio or Keidai , is a Japanese university located in Minato, Tokyo. It is known as the oldest institute of higher education in Japan. Founder Fukuzawa Yukichi originally established it as a school for Western studies in 1858 in Edo . It has eleven campuses in Tokyo and Kanagawa...

    , for their success in training pigeons to discriminate between the paintings of Picasso and those of Monet.
  • Public Health – Presented to Martha Kold Bakkevig of Sintef Unimed in Trondheim
    Trondheim
    Trondheim , historically, Nidaros and Trondhjem, is a city and municipality in Sør-Trøndelag county, Norway. With a population of 173,486, it is the third most populous municipality and city in the country, although the fourth largest metropolitan area. It is the administrative centre of...

    , Norway
    Norway
    Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...

    , and Ruth Nielsen of the Technical University of Denmark
    Technical University of Denmark
    The Technical University of Denmark , often simply referred to as DTU, is a university just north of Copenhagen, Denmark. It was founded in 1829 at the initiative of Hans Christian Ørsted as Denmark's first polytechnic, and is today ranked among Europe's leading engineering institutions, and the...

    , for their exhaustive study, "Impact of Wet Underwear on Thermoregulatory Responses and Thermal Comfort in the Cold."

1996

  • Art – Presented to Don Featherstone
    Donald Featherstone (artist)
    Donald "Don" Featherstone is an American artist who is most widely known for his 1957 creation of the Plastic Pink Flamingo while working for Union Products. Currently Featherstone resides in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, where he keeps 57 plastic flamingos on his front lawn...

     of Fitchburg, Massachusetts
    Fitchburg, Massachusetts
    Fitchburg is the third largest city in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 40,318 at the 2010 census. Fitchburg is home to Fitchburg State University as well as 17 public and private elementary and high schools.- History :...

    , for his ornamentally evolutionary invention, the plastic pink flamingo
    Plastic flamingo
    Pink plastic flamingos are one of the most famous of lawn ornaments in the United States, along with the garden gnome and other such ornamentation....

    . Featherstone was the first Ig Nobel Prize winner to appear in person at the awards ceremony to accept the award.
  • Biodiversity – Presented to Chonosuke Okamura
    Chonosuke Okamura
    was a twentieth-century Japanese palaeontologist noted for his claim to have discovered fossils from the Silurian period of miniature animals, ranging from humans to dinosaurs, and more than one thousand other extinct "mini-species", each less than 0.25 mm in length. He claimed that "There...

     of the Okamura Fossil Laboratory in Nagoya, Japan, for discovering the fossils of dinosaur
    Dinosaur
    Dinosaurs are a diverse group of animals of the clade and superorder Dinosauria. They were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates for over 160 million years, from the late Triassic period until the end of the Cretaceous , when the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event led to the extinction of...

    s, horse
    Horse
    The horse is one of two extant subspecies of Equus ferus, or the wild horse. It is a single-hooved mammal belonging to the taxonomic family Equidae. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million years from a small multi-toed creature into the large, single-toed animal of today...

    s, dragon
    Dragon
    A dragon is a legendary creature, typically with serpentine or reptilian traits, that feature in the myths of many cultures. There are two distinct cultural traditions of dragons: the European dragon, derived from European folk traditions and ultimately related to Greek and Middle Eastern...

    s, and more than one thousand other extinct "mini-species", each of which is less than 0.25 mm in length.
  • Biology – Presented jointly to Anders Barheim and Hogne Sandvik of the University of Bergen
    University of Bergen
    The University of Bergen is located in Bergen, Norway. Although founded as late as 1946, academic activity had taken place at Bergen Museum as far back as 1825. The university today serves more than 14,500 students...

    , Norway, for their report, "Effect of Ale, Garlic, and Soured Cream on the Appetite of Leeches."
  • Chemistry – Presented to George Goble
    George H. Goble
    George H. Goble is a staff member at the Purdue University Engineering Computer Network and a 1996 Ig Nobel Prize winner.Goble is commonly known as "ghg" since he has used that as a login id, and signature in digital communications, since the 1970s...

     of Purdue University
    Purdue University
    Purdue University, located in West Lafayette, Indiana, U.S., is the flagship university of the six-campus Purdue University system. Purdue was founded on May 6, 1869, as a land-grant university when the Indiana General Assembly, taking advantage of the Morrill Act, accepted a donation of land and...

    , for his blistering world record time for igniting a barbecue grill: three seconds, using charcoal
    Charcoal
    Charcoal is the dark grey residue consisting of carbon, and any remaining ash, obtained by removing water and other volatile constituents from animal and vegetation substances. Charcoal is usually produced by slow pyrolysis, the heating of wood or other substances in the absence of oxygen...

     and liquid oxygen
    Liquid oxygen
    Liquid oxygen — abbreviated LOx, LOX or Lox in the aerospace, submarine and gas industries — is one of the physical forms of elemental oxygen.-Physical properties:...

    .
  • Economics – Presented to Dr. Robert J. Genco of the University at Buffalo
    University at Buffalo, The State University of New York
    University at Buffalo, The State University of New York, also commonly known as the University at Buffalo or UB, is a public research university and a "University Center" in the State University of New York system. The university was founded by Millard Fillmore in 1846. UB has multiple campuses...

     for his discovery that "financial strain is a risk indicator for destructive periodontal disease."
  • Literature – Presented to the editors of the journal Social Text for eagerly publishing meaningless research that they could not understand, which claimed that reality does not exist. (See Sokal Affair
    Sokal Affair
    The Sokal affair, also known as the Sokal hoax, was a publishing hoax perpetrated by Alan Sokal, a physics professor at New York University. In 1996, Sokal submitted an article to Social Text, an academic journal of postmodern cultural studies...

     for details).
  • Medicine – Presented to James Johnston of R.J. Reynolds
    R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company
    The R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company , based in Winston-Salem, North Carolina and founded by R. J. Reynolds in 1875, is the second-largest tobacco company in the U.S. . RJR is an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Reynolds American Inc...

    , Joseph Taddeo of U.S. Tobacco, Andrew Tisch
    Andrew Tisch
    Andrew Tisch is the co-chair of Loews Corporation, the company founded by his father and uncle. Together with his brother, James S. Tisch, and his first cousin, Jonathan Tisch, Andrew oversees a holding company involved in hotels, oil, and insurance....

     of Lorillard
    Lorillard Tobacco Company
    Lorillard Tobacco Company is an American tobacco company marketing cigarettes under the brand names Newport, Maverick, Old Gold, Kent, True, Satin, and Max. Lorillard is a member of the National Black Chamber of Commerce.- History :...

    , William Campbell of Philip Morris
    Altria Group
    Altria Group, Inc. is based in Henrico County, Virginia, and is the parent company of Philip Morris USA, John Middleton, Inc., U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Company, Inc., Philip Morris Capital Corporation, and Chateau Ste. Michelle Wine Estates. It is one of the world's largest tobacco corporations...

    , Edward A. Horrigan of Liggett Group
    Liggett Group
    Liggett Group , formerly known as Liggett & Myers Tobacco Company, is the fourth largest tobacco company in the United States. Its headquarters are located in Durham, North Carolina, though its manufacturing facility is 30 miles to the west in Mebane, North Carolina...

    , Donald S. Johnston of American Tobacco Company
    American Tobacco Company
    The American Tobacco Company was a tobacco company founded in 1890 by J. B. Duke through a merger between a number of U.S. tobacco manufacturers including Allen and Ginter and Goodwin & Company...

    , and Thomas E. Sandefur, Jr., chairman of Brown and Williamson Tobacco Company
    Brown & Williamson
    Brown & Williamson was an American tobacco company and subsidiary of the giant British American Tobacco, that produced several popular cigarette brands. It became infamous as the focus of investigations for chemically enhancing the addictiveness of cigarettes...

    , for their unshakable discovery, as testified to the U.S. Congress
    United States Congress
    The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....

    , that nicotine
    Nicotine
    Nicotine is an alkaloid found in the nightshade family of plants that constitutes approximately 0.6–3.0% of the dry weight of tobacco, with biosynthesis taking place in the roots and accumulation occurring in the leaves...

     is not addictive.
  • Peace – Presented to Jacques Chirac
    Jacques Chirac
    Jacques René Chirac is a French politician who served as President of France from 1995 to 2007. He previously served as Prime Minister of France from 1974 to 1976 and from 1986 to 1988 , and as Mayor of Paris from 1977 to 1995.After completing his studies of the DEA's degree at the...

    , President of France, for commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of Hiroshima
    Hiroshima
    is the capital of Hiroshima Prefecture, and the largest city in the Chūgoku region of western Honshu, the largest island of Japan. It became best known as the first city in history to be destroyed by a nuclear weapon when the United States Army Air Forces dropped an atomic bomb on it at 8:15 A.M...

     with atomic bomb tests in the Pacific.
  • Physics – Presented to Robert Matthews
    Robert Matthews (scientist)
    Robert A.J. Matthews, born 23 September 1959, is a British physicist, mathematician, computer scientist, and journalist.Robert Matthews read Physics at Corpus Christi College, Oxford University, where he graduated in 1981...

     of Aston University
    Aston University
    Aston University is a "plate glass" campus university situated at Gosta Green, in the city centre of Birmingham, England.Established in 1895 as the Birmingham Municipal Technical School, Aston was granted its Royal Charter as Aston University on 22 April 1966...

    , England, for his studies of Murphy's Law
    Murphy's law
    Murphy's law is an adage or epigram that is typically stated as: "Anything that can go wrong will go wrong". - History :The perceived perversity of the universe has long been a subject of comment, and precursors to the modern version of Murphy's law are not hard to find. Recent significant...

    , and especially for demonstrating that toast often falls on the buttered side.
  • Public Health – Presented to Ellen Kleist of Nuuk, Greenland and Harald Moi of Oslo
    Oslo
    Oslo is a municipality, as well as the capital and most populous city in Norway. As a municipality , it was established on 1 January 1838. Founded around 1048 by King Harald III of Norway, the city was largely destroyed by fire in 1624. The city was moved under the reign of Denmark–Norway's King...

    , Norway
    Norway
    Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...

    , for their cautionary medical report "Transmission of Gonorrhea Through an Inflatable Doll."

1997

  • Astronomy – Presented to Richard C. Hoagland
    Richard C. Hoagland
    Richard Charles Hoagland, is an American author and a proponent of various conspiracy theories about NASA, lost alien civilizations on the Moon and on Mars and other related topics....

     of New Jersey
    New Jersey
    New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...

    , for identifying artificial features on the moon
    Moon
    The Moon is Earth's only known natural satellite,There are a number of near-Earth asteroids including 3753 Cruithne that are co-orbital with Earth: their orbits bring them close to Earth for periods of time but then alter in the long term . These are quasi-satellites and not true moons. For more...

     and on Mars
    Mars
    Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun in the Solar System. The planet is named after the Roman god of war, Mars. It is often described as the "Red Planet", as the iron oxide prevalent on its surface gives it a reddish appearance...

    , including a human face on Mars and ten-mile high buildings on the far side of the moon.
  • Biology – Presented to T. Yagyu and his colleagues from the University Hospital of Zurich
    Zürich
    Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in central Switzerland at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich...

    , Switzerland
    Switzerland
    Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

    , the Kansai Medical University in Osaka
    Osaka
    is a city in the Kansai region of Japan's main island of Honshu, a designated city under the Local Autonomy Law, the capital city of Osaka Prefecture and also the biggest part of Keihanshin area, which is represented by three major cities of Japan, Kyoto, Osaka and Kobe...

    , Japan
    Japan
    Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

    , and the Neuroscience Technology Research in Prague
    Prague
    Prague is the capital and largest city of the Czech Republic. Situated in the north-west of the country on the Vltava river, the city is home to about 1.3 million people, while its metropolitan area is estimated to have a population of over 2.3 million...

    , Czech Republic
    Czech Republic
    The Czech Republic is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Poland to the northeast, Slovakia to the east, Austria to the south, and Germany to the west and northwest....

    , for measuring people's brainwave patterns while they chewed different flavors of gum.
  • Communications – Presented to Sanford Wallace
    Sanford Wallace
    Sanford "Spamford" Wallace came to notoriety in 1997, promoting himself as the original Spam King. Wallace's prolific spamming has resulted in encounters with the United States government, anti-spam activists, and large corporations such as Facebook and MySpace...

    , president of Cyber Promotions of Philadelphia. Nothing has stopped this self-appointed courier from delivering electronic junk mail
    E-mail spam
    Email spam, also known as junk email or unsolicited bulk email , is a subset of spam that involves nearly identical messages sent to numerous recipients by email. Definitions of spam usually include the aspects that email is unsolicited and sent in bulk. One subset of UBE is UCE...

     to all the world.
  • Economics – Presented to Akihiro Yokoi of Wiz Company in Chiba
    Chiba Prefecture
    is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kantō region and the Greater Tokyo Area. Its capital is Chiba City.- History :Chiba Prefecture was established on June 15, 1873 with the merger of Kisarazu Prefecture and Inba Prefecture...

    , Japan
    Japan
    Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

    , and Aki Maita of Bandai
    Bandai
    is a Japanese toy making and video game company, as well as the producer of a large number of plastic model kits. It is the world's third-largest producer of toys . Some ex-Bandai group companies produce anime and tokusatsu programs...

     Company in Tokyo
    Tokyo
    , ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...

    , for diverting millions of man-hours of work into the husbandry of virtual pets.
  • Entomology – Presented to Mark Hostetler of the University of Florida
    University of Florida
    The University of Florida is an American public land-grant, sea-grant, and space-grant research university located on a campus in Gainesville, Florida. The university traces its historical origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its present Gainesville campus since September 1906...

    , for his book, That Gunk on Your Car, (ISBN 978-0-89815-961-5) which identifies the insect splats that appear on automobile
    Automobile
    An automobile, autocar, motor car or car is a wheeled motor vehicle used for transporting passengers, which also carries its own engine or motor...

     windows.
  • Literature – Presented to Doron Witztum, Eliyahu Rips
    Eliyahu Rips
    Eliyahu Rips, also Ilya Rips is a Latvian-born Israeli mathematician known for his research in geometric group theory. He became known to the general public following his coauthoring a paper on the Torah Code....

    , and Yoav Rosenberg of Israel
    Israel
    The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

    , and to Michael Drosnin of the United States
    United States
    The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

    , for their statistical discovery that the Bible
    Bible
    The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...

     contains a secret, hidden code
    Bible code
    The Bible code , also known as the Torah code, is a purported set of secret messages encoded within the text Hebrew Bible and describing prophesies and other guidance regarding the future. This hidden code has been described as a method by which specific letters from the text can be selected to...

    .
  • Medicine – Presented to Carl J. Charnetski and Francis X. Brennan, Jr. of Wilkes University
    Wilkes University
    Wilkes University is a private, non-denominational American university located in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. It has over 2,200 undergraduates and over 2,200 graduate students...

    , and James F. Harrison of Muzak
    Muzak
    Muzak Holdings LLC is a company based in metro Fort Mill, South Carolina, United States, just outside of Charlotte, North Carolina. Founded in 1934, Muzak Holdings is best known for distribution of background music to retail stores and other companies....

     Ltd. in Seattle, Washington, for their discovery that listening to Muzak
    Elevator music
    Elevator music refers to instrumental arrangements of popular music designed for playing in shopping malls, grocery stores, department stores, telephone systems , cruise ships, airports, doctors' and dentists' offices, and elevators...

     stimulates immunity system production and thus may help prevent the common cold
    Common cold
    The common cold is a viral infectious disease of the upper respiratory system, caused primarily by rhinoviruses and coronaviruses. Common symptoms include a cough, sore throat, runny nose, and fever...

    .
  • Meteorology – Presented to Bernard Vonnegut
    Bernard Vonnegut
    Bernard Vonnegut was an American atmospheric scientist credited with discovering that silver iodide could be used effectively in cloud seeding to produce snow and rain...

     of the State University of New York at Albany
    University at Albany, SUNY
    The State University of New York at Albany, also known as University at Albany, State University of New York, SUNY Albany or simply UAlbany, is a public university located in Albany, Guilderland, and East Greenbush, New York, United States; is the senior campus of the State University of New York ...

    , for his report, "Chicken Plucking as Measure of Tornado Wind Speed."
  • Peace – Presented to Harold Hillman
    Harold Hillman
    Harold Hillman is a British scientist and an expert in the neurobiology of execution methods.Hillman caused controversy in biological fields with his insistence that structures seen in cells under the electron microscope were little more than artefacts...

     of the University of Surrey
    University of Surrey
    The University of Surrey is a university located within the county town of Guildford, Surrey in the South East of England. It received its charter on 9 September 1966, and was previously situated near Battersea Park in south-west London. The institution was known as Battersea College of Technology...

    , England, for his report "The Possible Pain Experienced During Execution by Different Methods."
  • Physics – Presented to John Bockris
    John Bockris
    John O'Mara Bockris is a former professor of Chemistry at Texas A&M University whose unorthodox views have provoked controversy. He has authored, coauthored or edited more than 700 papers and 22 books principally in electrochemistry but also in environmental chemistry, photoelectrochemistry and...

     of Texas A&M University
    Texas A&M University
    Texas A&M University is a coeducational public research university located in College Station, Texas . It is the flagship institution of the Texas A&M University System. The sixth-largest university in the United States, A&M's enrollment for Fall 2011 was over 50,000 for the first time in school...

    , for his achievements in cold fusion
    Cold fusion
    Cold fusion, also called low-energy nuclear reaction , refers to the hypothesis that nuclear fusion might explain the results of a group of experiments conducted at ordinary temperatures . Both the experimental results and the hypothesis are disputed...

    , in the transmutation of base elements into gold, and in the electrochemical incineration of domestic rubbish.

1998

  • Chemistry – Presented to Jacques Benveniste
    Jacques Benveniste
    Jacques Benveniste was a French immunologist. In 1979 he published a well-known paper on the structure of platelet-activating factor and its relationship with histamine...

     of France, for his homeopathic
    Homeopathy
    Homeopathy is a form of alternative medicine in which practitioners claim to treat patients using highly diluted preparations that are believed to cause healthy people to exhibit symptoms that are similar to those exhibited by the patient...

     discovery that not only does water
    Water
    Water is a chemical substance with the chemical formula H2O. A water molecule contains one oxygen and two hydrogen atoms connected by covalent bonds. Water is a liquid at ambient conditions, but it often co-exists on Earth with its solid state, ice, and gaseous state . Water also exists in a...

     have memory
    Memory
    In psychology, memory is an organism's ability to store, retain, and recall information and experiences. Traditional studies of memory began in the fields of philosophy, including techniques of artificially enhancing memory....

    , but that the information can be transmitted over telephone line
    Telephone line
    A telephone line or telephone circuit is a single-user circuit on a telephone communication system...

    s and the Internet
    Internet
    The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...

    .
  • Biology – Presented to Peter Fong of Gettysburg College
    Gettysburg College
    Gettysburg College is a private four-year liberal arts college founded in 1832, in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, United States, adjacent to the famous battlefield. Its athletic teams are nicknamed the Bullets. Gettysburg College has about 2,700 students, with roughly equal numbers of men and women...

    , Gettysburg, Pennsylvania
    Gettysburg, Pennsylvania
    Gettysburg is a borough that is the county seat, part of the Gettysburg Battlefield, and the eponym for the 1863 Battle of Gettysburg. The town hosts visitors to the Gettysburg National Military Park and has 3 institutions of higher learning: Lutheran Theological Seminary, Gettysburg College, and...

    , for contributing to the happiness of clams
    CLaMS
    CLaMS is a modular chemistry transport model system developed at Forschungszentrum Jülich, Germany. CLaMS was first described by McKenna et al. and was expanded into three dimensions by Konopka et al....

     by giving them Prozac.
  • Economics – Presented to Richard Seed of Chicago
    Chicago
    Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...

     for his efforts to stoke up the world economy by cloning
    Cloning
    Cloning in biology is the process of producing similar populations of genetically identical individuals that occurs in nature when organisms such as bacteria, insects or plants reproduce asexually. Cloning in biotechnology refers to processes used to create copies of DNA fragments , cells , or...

     himself and other human beings.
  • Literature – Presented to Dr. Mara Sidoli of Washington, DC
    Washington, D.C.
    Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

    , for her illuminating report, "Farting as a Defence Against Unspeakable Dread".
  • Medicine – Presented to Patient Y and to his doctors, Caroline Mills, Meirion Llewelyn, David Kelly, and Peter Holt, of Royal Gwent Hospital
    Royal Gwent Hospital
    The Royal Gwent Hospital is the principal hospital in the city of Newport and the ancient county of Monmouthshire. It is located on Cardiff Road near the city centre...

    , in Newport
    Newport
    Newport is a city and unitary authority area in Wales. Standing on the banks of the River Usk, it is located about east of Cardiff and is the largest urban area within the historic county boundaries of Monmouthshire and the preserved county of Gwent...

     for the cautionary medical report, "A Man Who Pricked His Finger and Smelled Putrid for 5 Years."
  • Peace – Presented to Prime Minister of India
    Prime Minister of India
    The Prime Minister of India , as addressed to in the Constitution of India — Prime Minister for the Union, is the chief of government, head of the Council of Ministers and the leader of the majority party in parliament...

    , Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Prime Minister of Pakistan
    Prime Minister of Pakistan
    The Prime Minister of Pakistan , is the Head of Government of Pakistan who is designated to exercise as the country's Chief Executive. By the Constitution of Pakistan, Pakistan has the parliamentary democratic system of government...

    , Nawaz Sharif
    Nawaz Sharif
    Mian Mohammad Nawaz Sharif is a Pakistani conservative politician and steel magnate who served as 12th Prime Minister of Pakistan in two non-consecutive terms from November 1990 to July 1993, and from February 1997 to October 12, 1999...

    , for their aggressively peaceful detonations of atomic bombs.
  • Physics – Presented to Deepak Chopra
    Deepak Chopra
    Deepak Chopra is an Indian medical doctor, public speaker, and writer on subjects such as spirituality, Ayurveda and mind-body medicine. Chopra began his career as an endocrinologist and later shifted his focus to alternative medicine. Chopra now runs his own medical center, with a focus on...

     of The Chopra Center for Well Being, La Jolla, California, for his unique interpretation of quantum physics as it applies to life, liberty, and the pursuit of economic happiness.
  • Safety Engineering – Presented to Troy Hurtubise
    Troy Hurtubise
    Troy James Hurtubise is an inventor and conservationist from North Bay, Ontario, Canada noted for his often bizarre creations that he tests on himself in spectacular ways...

    , of North Bay, Ontario
    North Bay, Ontario
    North Bay is a city in Northeastern Ontario, Canada. It is the seat of Nipissing District, and takes its name from its position on the shore of Lake Nipissing.-History:...

    , for developing and personally testing a suit of armor that is impervious to grizzly bears.
  • Science Education – Presented to Dolores Krieger, Professor
    Professor
    A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...

     Emerita, New York University
    New York University
    New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...

    , for demonstrating the merits of therapeutic touch
    Therapeutic touch
    Therapeutic touch , also known as Non-Contact Therapeutic Touch , is an energy therapy which practitioners claim promotes healing and reduces pain and anxiety. Practitioners of therapeutic touch state that by placing their hands on, or near, a patient, they are able to detect and manipulate the...

    , a method by which nurses manipulate the energy fields of ailing patients by carefully avoiding physical contact with those patients.
  • Statistics – Presented to Jerald Bain of Mt. Sinai Hospital in Toronto
    Toronto
    Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...

     and Kerry Siminoski of the University of Alberta
    University of Alberta
    The University of Alberta is a public research university located in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Founded in 1908 by Alexander Cameron Rutherford, the first premier of Alberta and Henry Marshall Tory, its first president, it is widely recognized as one of the best universities in Canada...

    , for their carefully measured report, "The Relationship Among Height, Penile Length, and Foot Size".

1999

  • Biology – Presented to Dr. Paul Bosland, director of The Chile Pepper Institute, New Mexico State University
    New Mexico State University
    New Mexico State University at Las Cruces , is a major land-grant university in Las Cruces, New Mexico, United States...

    , Las Cruces, New Mexico
    Las Cruces, New Mexico
    Las Cruces, also known as "The City of the Crosses", is the county seat of Doña Ana County, New Mexico, United States. The population was 97,618 in 2010 according to the 2010 Census, making it the second largest city in the state....

    , for breeding a spiceless jalapeño
    Jalapeño
    The jalapeño is a medium-sized chili pepper that has a warm, burning sensation when eaten. A mature jalapeño fruit is 2–3½ inches long and is commonly picked and consumed while still green, but occasionally it is allowed to fully ripen and turn crimson red...

     chili pepper
    Chili pepper
    Chili pepper is the fruit of plants from the genus Capsicum, members of the nightshade family, Solanaceae. The term in British English and in Australia, New Zealand, India, Malaysia and other Asian countries is just chilli without pepper.Chili peppers originated in the Americas...

    .
  • Chemistry – Presented to Takeshi Makino, president of The Safety Detective Agency in Osaka, Japan, for his involvement with S-Check, an infidelity detection spray that wives can apply to their husbands' underwear.
  • Environmental Protection – Presented to Hyuk-ho Kwon of Kolon Company of Seoul
    Seoul
    Seoul , officially the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea. A megacity with a population of over 10 million, it is the largest city proper in the OECD developed world...

    , South Korea
    South Korea
    The Republic of Korea , , is a sovereign state in East Asia, located on the southern portion of the Korean Peninsula. It is neighbored by the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the East China Sea and Republic of China to the south...

    , for inventing the self-perfuming business suit.
  • Literature – Presented to the British Standards Institution for its six-page specification (BS 6008) of the proper way to make a cup of tea
    Tea
    Tea is an aromatic beverage prepared by adding cured leaves of the Camellia sinensis plant to hot water. The term also refers to the plant itself. After water, tea is the most widely consumed beverage in the world...

    .
  • Managed Health Care – Presented to George Blonsky and Charlotte Blonsky of New York City
    New York City
    New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

     and San Jose, California
    San Jose, California
    San Jose is the third-largest city in California, the tenth-largest in the U.S., and the county seat of Santa Clara County which is located at the southern end of San Francisco Bay...

    , for inventing a device to aid women in giving birth: the woman is strapped onto a circular table, and the table is then rotated at high speed.
  • Medicine – Presented to Dr. Arvid Vatle
    Arvid Vatle
    Arvid Vatle is a Norwegian medical doctor and winner of the 1999 Ig Nobel Prize in Medicine. He won the prize for his research in the containers used by his patients to deliver urine samples....

     of Stord
    Stord
    Stord is a municipality in the county of Hordaland, Norway. Stord is sometimes called "Norway in miniature" - as it has such a variety of landscapes: coastline, fjords, forests, agricultural land, and mountain areas....

    , Norway
    Norway
    Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...

    , for carefully collecting, classifying, and contemplating which kinds of containers his patients chose when submitting urine
    Urine
    Urine is a typically sterile liquid by-product of the body that is secreted by the kidneys through a process called urination and excreted through the urethra. Cellular metabolism generates numerous by-products, many rich in nitrogen, that require elimination from the bloodstream...

     samples.
  • Peace – Presented to Charl Fourie and Michelle Wong of Johannesburg
    Johannesburg
    Johannesburg also known as Jozi, Jo'burg or Egoli, is the largest city in South Africa, by population. Johannesburg is the provincial capital of Gauteng, the wealthiest province in South Africa, having the largest economy of any metropolitan region in Sub-Saharan Africa...

    , South Africa
    South Africa
    The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

    , for inventing the Blaster
    Blaster (flamethrower)
    The Blaster was a 1998 invention by South African inventor Charl Fourie designed to provide a defence against carjackings....

    , a foot-pedal activated flamethrower
    Flamethrower
    A flamethrower is a mechanical device designed to project a long controllable stream of fire.Some flamethrowers project a stream of ignited flammable liquid; some project a long gas flame. Most military flamethrowers use liquids, but commercial flamethrowers tend to use high-pressure propane and...

     that motorists can use against carjackers
    Carjacking
    Carjacking is a form of hijacking, where the crime is of stealing a motor vehicle and so also armed assault when the vehicle is occupied. Historically, such as in the rash of semi-trailer truck hijackings during the 1960s, the general term hijacking was used for that type of vehicle abduction,...

    .
  • Physics – Presented to Dr. Len Fisher of Bath, England and Sydney, Australia for calculating the optimal way to dunk a biscuit
    Biscuit
    A biscuit is a baked, edible, and commonly flour-based product. The term is used to apply to two distinctly different products in North America and the Commonwealth Nations....

    . Also, to Professor Jean-Marc Vanden-Broeck of the University of East Anglia
    University of East Anglia
    The University of East Anglia is a public research university based in Norwich, United Kingdom. It was established in 1963, and is a founder-member of the 1994 Group of research-intensive universities.-History:...

    , England, and Belgium, for calculating how to make a teapot
    Teapot
    A teapot is a vessel used for steeping tea leaves or a herbal mix in near-boiling water. Tea may be either in a tea bag or loose, in which case a tea strainer will be needed, either to hold the leaves as they steep or to catch the leaves inside the teapot when the tea is poured...

     spout that does not drip.
  • Science Education – Presented to the Kansas State Board of Education
    Kansas State Board of Education
    Kansas State Department Board of Education is Kansas's Board of Education, headquartered in Topeka. The board of education that controls the department is a constitutional body established in Article 6 of the Kansas Constitution. The ten members of the Board of Education are each elected to...

     and the Colorado State Board of Education
    Colorado State Board of Education
    The Colorado State Board of Education is a government body in the U.S. state of Colorado tasked with "general supervision of public schools." It is composed of members elected from districts corresponding to Colorado's congressional districts – following the 2000 census, there are seven districts...

    , for mandating that children should not believe
    Kansas evolution hearings
    The Kansas evolution hearings were a series of hearings held in Topeka, Kansas, United States May 5 to May 12, 2005 by the Kansas State Board of Education and its State Board Science Hearing Committee to change how evolution and the origin of life would be taught in the state's public high school...

     in Darwin's theory of evolution any more than they believe in Newton's theory of gravitation, Faraday
    Michael Faraday
    Michael Faraday, FRS was an English chemist and physicist who contributed to the fields of electromagnetism and electrochemistry....

    's and Maxwell
    James Clerk Maxwell
    James Clerk Maxwell of Glenlair was a Scottish physicist and mathematician. His most prominent achievement was formulating classical electromagnetic theory. This united all previously unrelated observations, experiments and equations of electricity, magnetism and optics into a consistent theory...

    's theory of electromagnetism
    Electromagnetism
    Electromagnetism is one of the four fundamental interactions in nature. The other three are the strong interaction, the weak interaction and gravitation...

    , or Pasteur
    Louis Pasteur
    Louis Pasteur was a French chemist and microbiologist born in Dole. He is remembered for his remarkable breakthroughs in the causes and preventions of diseases. His discoveries reduced mortality from puerperal fever, and he created the first vaccine for rabies and anthrax. His experiments...

    's theory that germs
    Germ cell
    A germ cell is any biological cell that gives rise to the gametes of an organism that reproduces sexually. In many animals, the germ cells originate near the gut of an embryo and migrate to the developing gonads. There, they undergo cell division of two types, mitosis and meiosis, followed by...

     cause disease
    Disease
    A disease is an abnormal condition affecting the body of an organism. It is often construed to be a medical condition associated with specific symptoms and signs. It may be caused by external factors, such as infectious disease, or it may be caused by internal dysfunctions, such as autoimmune...

    .
  • Sociology – Presented to Steve Penfold, of York University
    York University
    York University is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is Canada's third-largest university, Ontario's second-largest graduate school, and Canada's leading interdisciplinary university....

     in Toronto
    Toronto
    Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...

    , for doing his Ph.D. thesis on the history of Canadian
    Canada
    Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

     doughnut
    Doughnut
    A doughnut or donut is a fried dough food and is popular in many countries and prepared in various forms as a sweet snack that can be homemade or purchased in bakeries, supermarkets, food stalls, and franchised specialty outlets...

     shops.

2000

  • Biology – Presented to Richard Wassersug
    Richard Wassersug
    Dr. Richard Joel Wassersug is a professor in the Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology at Dalhousie University with cross appointments in the Departments of Biology and Psychology...

     of Dalhousie University
    Dalhousie University
    Dalhousie University is a public research university located in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. The university comprises eleven faculties including Schulich School of Law and Dalhousie University Faculty of Medicine. It also includes the faculties of architecture, planning and engineering located at...

    , for his firsthand report, "On the Comparative Palatability of Some Dry-Season Tadpole
    Tadpole
    A tadpole or polliwog is the wholly aquatic larval stage in the life cycle of an amphibian, particularly that of a frog or toad.- Appellation :...

    s from Costa Rica
    Costa Rica
    Costa Rica , officially the Republic of Costa Rica is a multilingual, multiethnic and multicultural country in Central America, bordered by Nicaragua to the north, Panama to the southeast, the Pacific Ocean to the west and the Caribbean Sea to the east....

    ".
  • Chemistry – Presented to Donatella Marazziti, Alessandra Rossi, and Giovanni B. Cassano of the University of Pisa
    University of Pisa
    The University of Pisa , located in Pisa, Tuscany, is one of the oldest universities in Italy. It was formally founded on September 3, 1343 by an edict of Pope Clement VI, although there had been lectures on law in Pisa since the 11th century...

    , Italy
    Italy
    Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

    , and Hagop S. Akiskal of the University of California, San Diego
    University of California, San Diego
    The University of California, San Diego, commonly known as UCSD or UC San Diego, is a public research university located in the La Jolla neighborhood of San Diego, California, United States...

    , for their discovery that, biochemically, romantic love may be indistinguishable from having severe obsessive-compulsive disorder
    Obsessive-compulsive disorder
    Obsessive–compulsive disorder is an anxiety disorder characterized by intrusive thoughts that produce uneasiness, apprehension, fear, or worry, by repetitive behaviors aimed at reducing the associated anxiety, or by a combination of such obsessions and compulsions...

    .
  • Computer Science – Presented to Chris Niswander of Tucson, Arizona
    Tucson, Arizona
    Tucson is a city in and the county seat of Pima County, Arizona, United States. The city is located 118 miles southeast of Phoenix and 60 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border. The 2010 United States Census puts the city's population at 520,116 with a metropolitan area population at 1,020,200...

    , for inventing PawSense, software that detects when a cat
    Cat
    The cat , also known as the domestic cat or housecat to distinguish it from other felids and felines, is a small, usually furry, domesticated, carnivorous mammal that is valued by humans for its companionship and for its ability to hunt vermin and household pests...

     is walking across your computer keyboard
    Computer keyboard
    In computing, a keyboard is a typewriter-style keyboard, which uses an arrangement of buttons or keys, to act as mechanical levers or electronic switches...

    .
  • Economics – Presented to The Reverend Sun Myung Moon
    Sun Myung Moon
    Sun Myung Moon is the Korean founder and leader of the worldwide Unification Church. He is also the founder of many other organizations and projects...

    , for bringing efficiency and steady growth to the mass marriage industry, with, according to his reports, a 36-couple wedding in 1960, a 430-couple wedding in 1968, an 1800-couple wedding in 1975, a 6000-couple wedding in 1982, a 30,000-couple wedding in 1992, a 360,000-couple wedding in 1995, and a 36,000,000-couple wedding in 1997.
  • Literature – Presented to Jasmuheen
    Jasmuheen
    Jasmuheen is an Australia-based proponent of "pranic nourishment" or breatharianism, defined as the practice of living without food or fluid of any sort...

     (formerly known as Ellen Greve) of Australia
    Australia
    Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

    , first lady of Breatharianism, for her book Living on Light, (ISBN 978-3-929512-35-9) which explains that although some people do eat food, they don't ever really need to.
  • Medicine – Presented to Willibrord Weijmar Schultz, Pek van Andel, and Eduard Mooyaart of Groningen, the Netherlands
    Netherlands
    The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

    , and Ida Sabelis of Amsterdam
    Amsterdam
    Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...

    , for their illuminating report "Magnetic Resonance Imaging of Male and Female Genitals During Coitus and Female Sexual Arousal."
  • Peace – Presented to The Royal Navy
    Royal Navy
    The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

    , for ordering its sailors to stop using live cannon
    Cannon
    A cannon is any piece of artillery that uses gunpowder or other usually explosive-based propellents to launch a projectile. Cannon vary in caliber, range, mobility, rate of fire, angle of fire, and firepower; different forms of cannon combine and balance these attributes in varying degrees,...

     shells, and to instead just shout "Bang!"
  • Physics – Presented to Andre Geim
    Andre Geim
    Andre Konstantin Geim, FRS is a Dutch-Russian-British physicist working at the University of Manchester. Geim was awarded the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physics jointly with Konstantin Novoselov for his work on graphene...

     of the University of Nijmegen, the Netherlands, and Michael Berry of Bristol University, England
    England
    England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

    , for using magnets to levitate a frog
    Frog
    Frogs are amphibians in the order Anura , formerly referred to as Salientia . Most frogs are characterized by a short body, webbed digits , protruding eyes and the absence of a tail...

    . Geim later shared the 2010 Nobel Prize in physics for his research on graphene, the first time anyone has been awarded both the Ig Nobel and (real) Nobel Prizes.
  • Psychology – Presented to David Dunning of Cornell University
    Cornell University
    Cornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...

     and Justin Kruger of the University of Illinois
    University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
    The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign is a large public research-intensive university in the state of Illinois, United States. It is the flagship campus of the University of Illinois system...

    , for their modest report, "Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments
    Illusory superiority
    Illusory superiority is a cognitive bias that causes people to overestimate their positive qualities and abilities and to underestimate their negative qualities, relative to others. This is evident in a variety of areas including intelligence, performance on tasks or tests, and the possession of...

    ".
  • Public Health – Presented to Jonathan Wyatt, Gordon McNaughton, and William Tullet of Glasgow
    Glasgow
    Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...

    , for their alarming report, "The Collapse of Toilets
    Toilet-related injury
    There are many toilet-related injuries and some toilet-related deaths throughout history and in urban legends.-Accidents:In young boys, one of the most common causes of genital injury is when the toilet seat falls down while using the toilet. Smaller children run the risk of drowning if they fall...

     in Glasgow".

2001

  • Astrophysics – Presented to Jack Van Impe
    Jack Van Impe
    Jack Leo Van Impe is a televangelist who is known for his half-hour weekly television series Jack Van Impe Presents, an eschatological commentary on the news of the week through his interpretation of the Bible...

     and Rexella Van Impe of Jack Van Impe Ministries, Rochester Hills, Michigan
    Rochester Hills, Michigan
    Rochester Hills is an affluent city in northeast Oakland County of the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 70,995. The city of Rochester is bounded on the north, south, and west by Rochester Hills...

    , for their discovery that black hole
    Black hole
    A black hole is a region of spacetime from which nothing, not even light, can escape. The theory of general relativity predicts that a sufficiently compact mass will deform spacetime to form a black hole. Around a black hole there is a mathematically defined surface called an event horizon that...

    s fulfill all the technical requirements for the location of Hell
    Hell
    In many religious traditions, a hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hells as endless. Religions with a cyclic history often depict a hell as an intermediary period between incarnations...

    .
  • Biology – Presented to Buck Weimer of Pueblo, Colorado
    Pueblo, Colorado
    Pueblo is a Home Rule Municipality that is the county seat and the most populous city of Pueblo County, Colorado, United States. The population was 106,595 in 2010 census, making it the 246th most populous city in the United States....

     for inventing Under-Ease, airtight underwear with a replaceable charcoal
    Charcoal
    Charcoal is the dark grey residue consisting of carbon, and any remaining ash, obtained by removing water and other volatile constituents from animal and vegetation substances. Charcoal is usually produced by slow pyrolysis, the heating of wood or other substances in the absence of oxygen...

     filter that removes bad-smelling gases
    Flatulence
    Flatulence is the expulsion through the rectum of a mixture of gases that are byproducts of the digestion process of mammals and other animals. The medical term for the mixture of gases is flatus, informally known as a fart, or simply gas...

     before they escape.
  • Economics – Presented to Joel Slemrod
    Joel Slemrod
    Joel Slemrod is a Professor of Economics at the University of Michigan and the Paul W. McCracken Collegiate Professor of Business Economics and Public Policy at the Stephen M. Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan.-General:...

    , of the University of Michigan
    University of Michigan
    The University of Michigan is a public research university located in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the United States. It is the state's oldest university and the flagship campus of the University of Michigan...

     Business School, and Wojciech Kopczuk, of the University of British Columbia
    University of British Columbia
    The University of British Columbia is a public research university. UBC’s two main campuses are situated in Vancouver and in Kelowna in the Okanagan Valley...

    , for their conclusion that people find a way to postpone their deaths if that would qualify them for a lower rate on the inheritance tax
    Inheritance tax
    An inheritance tax or estate tax is a levy paid by a person who inherits money or property or a tax on the estate of a person who has died...

    .
  • Literature – Presented to John Richards of Boston, England
    Boston, Lincolnshire
    Boston is a town and small port in Lincolnshire, on the east coast of England. It is the largest town of the wider Borough of Boston local government district and had a total population of 55,750 at the 2001 census...

    , founder of the Apostrophe Protection Society
    Apostrophe Protection Society
    The Apostrophe Protection Society is a UK society that has "the specific aim of preserving the correct use of this currently much abused punctuation mark"...

    , for his efforts to protect, promote, and defend the differences between the plural
    Plural
    In linguistics, plurality or [a] plural is a concept of quantity representing a value of more-than-one. Typically applied to nouns, a plural word or marker is used to distinguish a value other than the default quantity of a noun, which is typically one...

     and the possessive
    Possessive
    Possessive may be:* Possessive case* Possessive adjective* Possessive pronoun* Possessive suffix* Possessive construction, pattern among words indicating possession * For possessive behavior in a relationship, see Attachment in adults...

    .
  • Medicine – Presented to Peter Barss of McGill University
    McGill University
    Mohammed Fathy is a public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The university bears the name of James McGill, a prominent Montreal merchant from Glasgow, Scotland, whose bequest formed the beginning of the university...

    , Canada
    Canada
    Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

    , for his impactful medical report "Injuries Due to Falling Coconuts".
  • Peace – Presented to Viliumas Malinauskas of Grūtas, Lithuania
    Lithuania
    Lithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...

    , for creating the amusement park
    Amusement park
    thumb|Cinderella Castle in [[Magic Kingdom]], [[Disney World]]Amusement and theme parks are terms for a group of entertainment attractions and rides and other events in a location for the enjoyment of large numbers of people...

     known as "Stalin World
    Grutas Park
    Grūtas Park is a sculpture garden of Soviet-era statues and an exposition of other Soviet ideological relics from the times of the Lithuanian SSR...

    ".
  • Physics – Presented to David Schmidt of the University of Massachusetts
    University of Massachusetts Amherst
    The University of Massachusetts Amherst is a public research and land-grant university in Amherst, Massachusetts, United States and the flagship of the University of Massachusetts system...

    , for his partial explanation of the shower-curtain effect
    Shower-curtain effect
    In physics, the shower-curtain effect is the phenomenon in which a shower curtain gets blown inward with a running shower. The problem of the cause of this effect has been featured in Scientific American magazine, with several theories given to explain the phenomenon but no definite conclusion.As a...

    : a shower curtain tends to billow inwards while a shower is being taken.
  • Psychology – Presented to Lawrence W. Sherman of Miami University
    Miami University
    Miami University is a coeducational public research university located in Oxford, Ohio, United States. Founded in 1809, it is the 10th oldest public university in the United States and the second oldest university in Ohio, founded four years after Ohio University. In its 2012 edition, U.S...

    , Ohio, for his influential research report "An Ecological Study of Glee
    Happiness
    Happiness is a mental state of well-being characterized by positive emotions ranging from contentment to intense joy. A variety of biological, psychological, religious, and philosophical approaches have striven to define happiness and identify its sources....

     in Small Groups of Preschool Children".
  • Public Health – Presented to Chittaranjan Andrade and B.S. Srihari of the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences, Bangalore
    Bangalore
    Bengaluru , formerly called Bengaluru is the capital of the Indian state of Karnataka. Bangalore is nicknamed the Garden City and was once called a pensioner's paradise. Located on the Deccan Plateau in the south-eastern part of Karnataka, Bangalore is India's third most populous city and...

    , India
    India
    India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

    , for their probing medical discovery that nose picking is a common activity among adolescents.
  • Technology – Presented jointly to John Keogh of Hawthorn, Victoria
    Hawthorn, Victoria
    Hawthorn is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Boroondara...

    , Australia
    Australia
    Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

    , for patent
    Patent
    A patent is a form of intellectual property. It consists of a set of exclusive rights granted by a sovereign state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for the public disclosure of an invention....

    ing the wheel in the year 2001, and to the Australian Patent Office (IP Australia
    IP Australia
    The Australian Patent Office is a division of IP Australia which is an agency of the Australian Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research. APO issues patents for inventions. APO was established in 1904 by the Commonwealth of Australia and since 1998 has been located in one building,...

    ) for granting him Innovation Patent #2001100012

2002

  • Biology – Presented to Norma E. Bubier, Charles G.M. Paxton, Phil Bowers, and D. Charles Deeming of the United Kingdom
    United Kingdom
    The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

    , for their report "Courtship Behaviour of Ostrich
    Ostrich
    The Ostrich is one or two species of large flightless birds native to Africa, the only living member of the genus Struthio. Some analyses indicate that the Somali Ostrich may be better considered a full species apart from the Common Ostrich, but most taxonomists consider it to be a...

    es Towards Humans Under Farming Conditions in Britain".
  • Chemistry – Presented to Theodore Gray
    Theodore Gray
    Theodore W. Gray is one of the founders of Wolfram Research and is currently Wolfram's Director of User Interface Technology.He is a prominent element collector and created a wooden periodic table with compartments for samples of each of the elements...

     of Wolfram Research, in Champaign, Illinois
    Champaign, Illinois
    Champaign is a city in Champaign County, Illinois, in the United States. The city is located south of Chicago, west of Indianapolis, Indiana, and 178 miles northeast of St. Louis, Missouri. Though surrounded by farm communities, Champaign is notable for sharing the campus of the University of...

    , for gathering many elements of the periodic table
    Periodic table
    The periodic table of the chemical elements is a tabular display of the 118 known chemical elements organized by selected properties of their atomic structures. Elements are presented by increasing atomic number, the number of protons in an atom's atomic nucleus...

    , and assembling them into the form of a four-legged periodic table
    Table (information)
    A table is a means of arranging data in rows and columns.Production % of goalNorth 4087102%South 4093110% The use of tables is pervasive throughout all communication, research and data analysis. Tables appear in print media, handwritten notes, computer software, architectural...

     table
    Table (furniture)
    A table is a form of furniture with a flat and satisfactory horizontal upper surface used to support objects of interest, for storage, show, and/or manipulation...

    .
  • Economics – Presented to the executives, corporate directors, and auditors of Enron
    Enron
    Enron Corporation was an American energy, commodities, and services company based in Houston, Texas. Before its bankruptcy on December 2, 2001, Enron employed approximately 22,000 staff and was one of the world's leading electricity, natural gas, communications, and pulp and paper companies, with...

    , Lernaut & Hauspie (Belgium
    Belgium
    Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

    ), Adelphia, Bank of Commerce and Credit International
    Bank of Credit and Commerce International
    The Bank of Credit and Commerce International was a major international bank founded in 1972 by Agha Hasan Abedi, a Pakistani financier. The Bank was registered in Luxembourg with head offices in Karachi and London. Within a decade BCCI touched its peak...

     (Pakistan
    Pakistan
    Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

    ), Cendant
    Cendant
    Cendant Corporation was a New York-based provider of business and consumer services, primarily within the real estate and travel industries. In 2005 and 2006, Cendant broke up and spun off or sold its constituent businesses...

    , CMS Energy
    CMS Energy
    CMS Energy is a public utility supplying electric power and natural gas to Metro Detroit and most of Michigan. Its headquarters are located in Jackson, Michigan. The company has operated since 1890....

    , Duke Energy
    Duke Energy
    Duke Energy , headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, is an energy company with assets in the United States, Canada and Latin America.-Overview:...

    , Dynegy
    Dynegy
    Dynegy Inc. , based in Houston, Texas, United States, is a large owner and operator of power plants and a player in the natural gas liquids and coal business...

    , Gazprom
    Gazprom
    Open Joint Stock Company Gazprom is the largest extractor of natural gas in the world and the largest Russian company. Its headquarters are in Cheryomushki District, South-Western Administrative Okrug, Moscow...

     (Russia
    Russia
    Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

    ), Global Crossing
    Global Crossing
    Global Crossing Limited was a telecommunications company that provides computer networking services worldwide. It maintained a large backbone and offered transit and peering links, VPN, leased lines, audio and video conferencing, long distance telephone, managed services, dialup, colocation and...

    , HIH Insurance
    HIH Insurance
    HIH Insurance was Australia's second largest insurance company. It was placed into provisional liquidation on 15 March 2001. The demise of HIH is considered to be the largest corporate collapse in Australia's history, with liquidators estimating that HIH's losses totalled up to $5.3 billion...

     (Australia
    Australia
    Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

    ), Informix
    Informix
    IBM Informix is a family of relational database management system developed by IBM. It is positioned as IBM's flagship data server for online transaction processing as well as integrated solutions...

    , Kmart
    Kmart
    Kmart, sometimes styled as "K-Mart," is a chain of discount department stores. The chain acquired Sears in 2005, forming a new corporation under the name Sears Holdings Corporation. The company was founded in 1962 and is the third largest discount store chain in the world, behind Wal-Mart and...

    , Maxwell Communications
    Maxwell Communications Corporation
    Maxwell Communications Corporation plc was a leading British media business. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange and was a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index.-History:...

     (UK), McKessonHBOC, Merrill Lynch
    Merrill Lynch
    Merrill Lynch is the wealth management division of Bank of America. With over 15,000 financial advisors and $2.2 trillion in client assets it is the world's largest brokerage. Formerly known as Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc., prior to 2009 the firm was publicly owned and traded on the New York...

    , Merck
    Merck & Co.
    Merck & Co., Inc. , also known as Merck Sharp & Dohme or MSD outside the United States and Canada, is one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world. The Merck headquarters is located in Whitehouse Station, New Jersey, an unincorporated area in Readington Township...

    , Peregrine Systems
    Peregrine Systems
    Peregrine Systems, Inc., an enterprise software company, was founded in 1981 and sold enterprise asset management, change management, and ITIL-based IT service management software. Following an accounting scandal and bankruptcy in 2003, Peregrine was acquired by Hewlett-Packard in 2005...

    , Qwest Communications, Reliant Resources, Rent-Way
    Rent-A-Center
    Rent-A-Center is an American public furniture and electronics rent to own company based in Plano, Texas. The company was incorporated in 1986 and as of 2010 operates 3,007 company-owned stores in the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico and Mexico, accounting for 38% of the rent-to-own market in...

    , Rite Aid
    Rite Aid
    Rite Aid is a drugstore chain in the United States and a Fortune 500 company headquartered in East Pennsboro Township, Pennsylvania, near Camp Hill. Rite Aid is the largest drugstore chain on the East Coast and the third largest drugstore chain in the U.S....

    , Sunbeam
    Sunbeam Products
    Sunbeam Products is an American brand that has produced electric home appliances since 1910. Their products have included the Mixmaster mixer, the Sunbeam CG waffle iron, Coffeemaster and the fully automatic T20 toaster. Sunbeam is owned by Jarden Consumer Solutions after Jarden's acquisition in...

    , Tyco
    Tyco International
    Tyco International Ltd. is a highly diversified global manufacturing company incorporated in Switzerland, with United States operational headquarters in Princeton, New Jersey...

    , Waste Management
    Waste Management, Inc
    Waste Management, Inc. is a waste management, comprehensive waste, and environmental services company in North America. Founded in 1894, the company is headquartered in Suite 4000 at the First City Tower in Downtown Houston, Texas, in the United States....

    , WorldCom, Xerox
    Xerox
    Xerox Corporation is an American multinational document management corporation that produced and sells a range of color and black-and-white printers, multifunction systems, photo copiers, digital production printing presses, and related consulting services and supplies...

    , and Arthur Andersen
    Arthur Andersen
    Arthur Andersen LLP, based in Chicago, was once one of the "Big Five" accounting firms among PricewaterhouseCoopers, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, Ernst & Young and KPMG, providing auditing, tax, and consulting services to large corporations...

    , for adapting the mathematical concept of imaginary number
    Imaginary number
    An imaginary number is any number whose square is a real number less than zero. When any real number is squared, the result is never negative, but the square of an imaginary number is always negative...

    s for use in the business world. (All companies except for Arthur Andersen were forced to restate their financial reports due to false or incorrect accounting. Andersen was the accounting firm most identified with the scandals, having been indicted on criminal charges stemming from its actions as auditor of Enron. All companies are U.S.-based unless otherwise noted.)
  • Hygiene – Presented to Eduardo Segura, from Tarragona
    Tarragona
    Tarragona is a city located in the south of Catalonia on the north-east of Spain, by the Mediterranean. It is the capital of the Spanish province of the same name and the capital of the Catalan comarca Tarragonès. In the medieval and modern times it was the capital of the Vegueria of Tarragona...

    , Catalonia
    Catalonia
    Catalonia is an autonomous community in northeastern Spain, with the official status of a "nationality" of Spain. Catalonia comprises four provinces: Barcelona, Girona, Lleida, and Tarragona. Its capital and largest city is Barcelona. Catalonia covers an area of 32,114 km² and has an...

     (Spain), for inventing a washing machine
    Washing machine
    A washing machine is a machine designed to wash laundry, such as clothing, towels and sheets...

     for cat
    Cat
    The cat , also known as the domestic cat or housecat to distinguish it from other felids and felines, is a small, usually furry, domesticated, carnivorous mammal that is valued by humans for its companionship and for its ability to hunt vermin and household pests...

    s and dog
    Dog
    The domestic dog is a domesticated form of the gray wolf, a member of the Canidae family of the order Carnivora. The term is used for both feral and pet varieties. The dog may have been the first animal to be domesticated, and has been the most widely kept working, hunting, and companion animal in...

    s, bearing the commercial name of Lavakan de Aste,
  • Interdisciplinary Research – Presented to Karl Kruszelnicki
    Karl Kruszelnicki
    Karl Kruszelnicki AM is a scientist, who is best known as an author and science commentator on Australian radio and television. He is often referred to as Dr Karl....

     of The University of Sydney
    University of Sydney
    The University of Sydney is a public university located in Sydney, New South Wales. The main campus spreads across the suburbs of Camperdown and Darlington on the southwestern outskirts of the Sydney CBD. Founded in 1850, it is the oldest university in Australia and Oceania...

    , Australia
    Australia
    Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

    , for performing a comprehensive survey of human belly button fluff – who gets it, when, what color, and how much.
  • Literature – Presented jointly to Vicki L. Silvers of the University of Nevada-Reno
    University of Nevada, Reno
    The University of Nevada, Reno , is a teaching and research university established in 1874 and located in Reno, Nevada, USA...

     and David S. Kreiner of Central Missouri State University
    University of Central Missouri
    The University of Central Missouri is a four-year public institution in Warrensburg, Missouri.- History :...

    , for their colorful report "The Effects of Pre-Existing Inappropriate Highlighting on Reading Comprehension".
  • Mathematics – Presented to K.P. Sreekumar and G. Nirmalan of Kerala Agricultural University, India
    India
    India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

    , for their analytical report "Estimation of the Total Surface Area in Indian Elephant
    Indian Elephant
    The Indian Elephant is one of three recognized subspecies of the Asian elephant, and native to mainland Asia. Since 1986, Elephas maximus has been listed as endangered by IUCN as the population has declined by at least 50% over the last three generations, estimated to be 60–75 years...

    s".
  • Medicine – Presented to Chris McManus of University College London
    University College London
    University College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and the oldest and largest constituent college of the federal University of London...

    , for his excruciatingly balanced report, "Scrotal Asymmetry in Man and in Ancient Sculpture".
  • Peace – Presented to Keita Sato, President of Takara Co., Dr. Matsumi Suzuki, President of Japan Acoustic Lab, and Dr. Norio Kogure, Executive Director, Kogure Veterinary Hospital, for promoting peace and harmony between the species by inventing Bow-Lingual
    Bow-Lingual
    , or "Bow-Lingual" as the North American version is spelled, is a computer-based dog-to-human language translation device developed by Japanese toy company Takara and first sold in Japan in 2002. Versions for South Korea and the United States were launched in 2003. The device was named by Time...

    , a computer-based automatic dog-to-human language translation device.
  • Physics – Presented to Arnd Leike of the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, for demonstrating that beer
    Beer
    Beer is the world's most widely consumed andprobably oldest alcoholic beverage; it is the third most popular drink overall, after water and tea. It is produced by the brewing and fermentation of sugars, mainly derived from malted cereal grains, most commonly malted barley and malted wheat...

     froth obeys the mathematical law of exponential decay.

2003

  • Biology – Presented to C.W. Moeliker, of Natuurhistorisch Museum Rotterdam in Rotterdam, the Netherlands
    Natuurhistorisch Museum Rotterdam
    The ' is a natural history museum at Museumpark in Rotterdam, The Netherlands.The museum is located in the Villa Dijkzigt, dating from 1852 and extended in 1995 with a modern glazed pavilion which was designed by the Dutch architect Erick van Egeraat. Villa Dijkzigt was originally built by J. F...

    , for documenting the first scientifically recorded case of homosexual necrophilia in the mallard duck.
  • Chemistry – Presented to Yukio Hirose of Kanazawa University, for his chemical investigation of a bronze statue, in the city of Kanazawa
    Kanazawa, Ishikawa
    is the capital city of Ishikawa Prefecture, Japan.-Geography, climate, and population:Kanazawa sits on the Sea of Japan, bordered by the Japan Alps, Hakusan National Park and Noto Peninsula National Park. The city sits between the Sai and Asano rivers. Its total area is 467.77 km².Kanazawa's...

    , that fails to attract pigeons.
  • Economics – Presented to Karl Schwärzler and the nation of Liechtenstein
    Liechtenstein
    The Principality of Liechtenstein is a doubly landlocked alpine country in Central Europe, bordered by Switzerland to the west and south and by Austria to the east. Its area is just over , and it has an estimated population of 35,000. Its capital is Vaduz. The biggest town is Schaan...

    , for making it possible to rent the entire country for corporate conventions, wedding
    Wedding
    A wedding is the ceremony in which two people are united in marriage or a similar institution. Wedding traditions and customs vary greatly between cultures, ethnic groups, religions, countries, and social classes...

    s, bar mitzvahs, and other gatherings.
  • Engineering – Presented to John Paul Stapp, Edward A. Murphy, Jr., and George Nichols, for jointly giving birth in 1949 to Murphy's Law
    Murphy's law
    Murphy's law is an adage or epigram that is typically stated as: "Anything that can go wrong will go wrong". - History :The perceived perversity of the universe has long been a subject of comment, and precursors to the modern version of Murphy's law are not hard to find. Recent significant...

    , the basic engineering principle that "If there are two or more ways to do something, and one of those ways can result in a catastrophe, someone will do it" (or, in other words: "If anything can go wrong, it will").
  • Interdisciplinary Research – Presented to Stefano Ghirlanda, Liselotte Jansson, and Magnus Enquis of Stockholm University
    Stockholm University
    Stockholm University is a state university in Stockholm, Sweden. It has over 28,000 students at four faculties, making it one of the largest universities in Scandinavia. The institution is also frequently regarded as one of the top 100 universities in the world...

    , for their inevitable report "Chicken
    Chicken
    The chicken is a domesticated fowl, a subspecies of the Red Junglefowl. As one of the most common and widespread domestic animals, and with a population of more than 24 billion in 2003, there are more chickens in the world than any other species of bird...

    s Prefer Beautiful Humans."
  • Literature – Presented to John Trinkaus, of the Zicklin School of Business
    Zicklin School of Business
    The Zicklin School of Business is Baruch College's business school. It was established in 1919 and is one of the oldest business schools in the world. It is named after financier and alumnus Lawrence Zicklin...

    , New York City
    New York City
    New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

    , for meticulously collecting data and publishing more than 80 detailed academic reports about things that annoyed him, such as:
    • What percentage of young people wear baseball cap
      Baseball cap
      A baseball cap is a type of soft cap with a rounded stiff brim. The front of the cap typically contains designs or logos of sports teams ,...

      s with the peak facing to the rear rather than to the front;
    • What percentage of pedestrian
      Pedestrian
      A pedestrian is a person traveling on foot, whether walking or running. In some communities, those traveling using roller skates or skateboards are also considered to be pedestrians. In modern times, the term mostly refers to someone walking on a road or footpath, but this was not the case...

      s wear sport shoes that are white rather than some other color;
    • What percentage of swimmers swim laps in the shallow end of a pool rather than the deep end;
    • What percentage of automobile drivers almost, but not completely, come to a stop at one particular stop-sign;
    • What percentage of commuters carry attaché cases;
    • What percentage of shoppers exceed the number of items permitted in a supermarket's express checkout lane;
    • What percentage of students dislike the taste of Brussels sprouts.
  • Medicine – Presented to Eleanor Maguire, David Gadian, Ingrid Johnsrude
    Ingrid Johnsrude
    Ingrid Suzanne Johnsrude is a Canadian neuroscientist, an associate professor of psychology in Queen's University, and the holder of the Canada Research Chair in Cognitive Neuroscience...

    , Catriona Good, John Ashburner, Richard Frackowiak, and Christopher Frith of University College London
    University College London
    University College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and the oldest and largest constituent college of the federal University of London...

    , for presenting evidence that the hippocampi
    Hippocampus
    The hippocampus is a major component of the brains of humans and other vertebrates. It belongs to the limbic system and plays important roles in the consolidation of information from short-term memory to long-term memory and spatial navigation. Humans and other mammals have two hippocampi, one in...

     of London
    London
    London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

     taxi drivers
    Taxicab
    A taxicab, also taxi or cab, is a type of vehicle for hire with a driver, used by a single passenger or small group of passengers, often for a non-shared ride. A taxicab conveys passengers between locations of their choice...

     are more highly developed than those of their fellow citizens.
  • Peace – Presented to Lal Bihari
    Lal Bihari
    Lal Bihari is a farmer from Uttar Pradesh, India who was officially dead between 1976 and 1994. He founded Mritak Sangh or the Association of the Dead in Uttar Pradesh, India...

    , of Uttar Pradesh
    Uttar Pradesh
    Uttar Pradesh abbreviation U.P. , is a state located in the northern part of India. With a population of over 200 million people, it is India's most populous state, as well as the world's most populous sub-national entity...

    , India
    India
    India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

    , for a triple accomplishment: First, for leading an active life even though he has been declared legally dead; second, for waging a lively posthumous campaign against bureaucratic inertia and greedy relatives; and third, for creating the Association of Dead People
    Association of the Dead
    The Uttar Pradesh Association of Dead People is a northern Indian pressure group that seeks to reclaim the legal rights of those falsely listed by the government as being dead....

    . Lal Bihari overcame the handicap of being dead, and managed to obtain a passport from the India
    India
    India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

    n government so that he could travel to Harvard
    Harvard University
    Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...

     to accept his Prize. However, the U.S. government refused to allow him into the country. His friend Madhu Kapoor therefore came to the Ig Nobel Ceremony and accepted the Prize on behalf of Lal Bihari. Several weeks later, the Prize was presented to Lal Bihari himself in a special ceremony in India.
  • Physics – Presented to Jack Harvey, John Culvenor, Warren Payne, Steve Cowle, Michael Lawrance, David Stuart, and Robyn Williams
    Robyn Williams
    Robyn Williams AM is a science journalist and broadcaster resident in Australia who has hosted the Science Show on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation since 1975, Ockham's Razor and In Conversation .-Background:Robyn Williams was born in Buckinghamshire, England, and educated in Vienna and...

     of Australia
    Australia
    Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

    , for their irresistible report "An analysis of the forces required to drag sheep over various surfaces".
  • Psychology – Presented to Gian Vittorio Caprara and Claudio Barbaranelli of the University of Rome La Sapienza
    University of Rome La Sapienza
    The Sapienza University of Rome, officially Sapienza – Università di Roma, formerly known as Università degli studi di Roma "La Sapienza", is a coeducational, autonomous state university in Rome, Italy...

    , and to Philip Zimbardo
    Philip Zimbardo
    Philip George Zimbardo is an American psychologist and a professor emeritus at Stanford University. He is president of the Heroic Imagination Project...

     of Stanford University
    Stanford University
    The Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University or Stanford, is a private research university on an campus located near Palo Alto, California. It is situated in the northwestern Santa Clara Valley on the San Francisco Peninsula, approximately northwest of San...

    , for their discerning report "Politician
    Politician
    A politician, political leader, or political figure is an individual who is involved in influencing public policy and decision making...

    s' Uniquely Simple Personalities".

2004

  • Biology – Presented to Ben Wilson of the University of British Columbia
    University of British Columbia
    The University of British Columbia is a public research university. UBC’s two main campuses are situated in Vancouver and in Kelowna in the Okanagan Valley...

    , Lawrence Dill of Simon Fraser University
    Simon Fraser University
    Simon Fraser University is a Canadian public research university in British Columbia with its main campus on Burnaby Mountain in Burnaby, and satellite campuses in Vancouver and Surrey. The main campus in Burnaby, located from downtown Vancouver, was established in 1965 and has more than 34,000...

    , Canada, Robert Batty of the Scottish Association for Marine Science, Magnus Wahlberg of the University of Aarhus
    University of Aarhus
    Aarhus University , located in the city of Aarhus, Denmark, is Denmark's second oldest and second largest university...

    , Denmark
    Denmark
    Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...

    , and Håkan Westerberg of Sweden
    Sweden
    Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

    's National Board of Fisheries, for showing that herring
    Herring
    Herring is an oily fish of the genus Clupea, found in the shallow, temperate waters of the North Pacific and the North Atlantic oceans, including the Baltic Sea. Three species of Clupea are recognized. The main taxa, the Atlantic herring and the Pacific herring may each be divided into subspecies...

    s apparently communicate by farting
    Flatulence
    Flatulence is the expulsion through the rectum of a mixture of gases that are byproducts of the digestion process of mammals and other animals. The medical term for the mixture of gases is flatus, informally known as a fart, or simply gas...

    .
  • Chemistry – Presented to The Coca-Cola Company
    The Coca-Cola Company
    The Coca-Cola Company is an American multinational beverage corporation and manufacturer, retailer and marketer of non-alcoholic beverage concentrates and syrups. The company is best known for its flagship product Coca-Cola, invented in 1886 by pharmacist John Stith Pemberton in Columbus, Georgia...

     of Great Britain
    Great Britain
    Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...

    , for using advanced technology to convert liquid from the River Thames
    River Thames
    The River Thames flows through southern England. It is the longest river entirely in England and the second longest in the United Kingdom. While it is best known because its lower reaches flow through central London, the river flows alongside several other towns and cities, including Oxford,...

     into Dasani
    Dasani
    Dasani is a brand of bottled water from the Coca-Cola company, launched in 1999, after the success of Aquafina . It is one of many brands of Coca-Cola bottled water sold around the world....

    , a brand of bottled water
    Water
    Water is a chemical substance with the chemical formula H2O. A water molecule contains one oxygen and two hydrogen atoms connected by covalent bonds. Water is a liquid at ambient conditions, but it often co-exists on Earth with its solid state, ice, and gaseous state . Water also exists in a...

    , which for precautionary reasons has been made unavailable to consumers.
  • Economics – Presented to the Vatican
    Holy See
    The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Catholic Church in Rome, in which its Bishop is commonly known as the Pope. It is the preeminent episcopal see of the Catholic Church, forming the central government of the Church. As such, diplomatically, and in other spheres the Holy See acts and...

    , for outsourcing prayers to India
    India
    India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

    .
  • Engineering – Presented jointly to Donald J. Smith and his father, Frank J. Smith, of Orlando, Florida
    Orlando, Florida
    Orlando is a city in the central region of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat of Orange County, and the center of the Greater Orlando metropolitan area. According to the 2010 US Census, the city had a population of 238,300, making Orlando the 79th largest city in the United States...

    , for patenting the comb over
    Comb over
    A comb over or combover is a hairstyle worn by bald or balding men in which the hair on one side of the head is grown long and then combed over the bald area to minimize the display of baldness. A variation of the comb over where baldness is concealed by long hair combed in three separate...

     .
  • Literature – Presented to The American Nudist Research Library
    American Nudist Research Library
    The American Nudist Research Library is the first and believed to be the largest nudist/naturist library in North America. The American Nudist Research Library is located in Kissimmee, Florida. Kissimmee is also the location of the headquarters of the American Association for Nude Recreation...

     of Kissimmee, Florida
    Kissimmee, Florida
    Kissimmee is a city in Osceola County, Florida, United States. As of the 2010 census, the population was 59,682. It is the county seat of Osceola County...

    , for preserving nudist history so that everyone can see it.
  • Medicine – Presented jointly to Steven Stack of Wayne State University
    Wayne State University
    Wayne State University is a public research university located in Detroit, Michigan, United States, in the city's Midtown Cultural Center Historic District. Founded in 1868, WSU consists of 13 schools and colleges offering more than 400 major subject areas to over 32,000 graduate and...

    , Detroit, Michigan
    Detroit, Michigan
    Detroit is the major city among the primary cultural, financial, and transportation centers in the Metro Detroit area, a region of 5.2 million people. As the seat of Wayne County, the city of Detroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and serves as a major port on the Detroit River...

    , and James Gundlach of Auburn University
    Auburn University
    Auburn University is a public university located in Auburn, Alabama, United States. With more than 25,000 students and 1,200 faculty members, it is one of the largest universities in the state. Auburn was chartered on February 7, 1856, as the East Alabama Male College, a private liberal arts...

    , Auburn, Alabama
    Auburn, Alabama
    Auburn is a city in Lee County, Alabama, United States. It is the largest city in eastern Alabama with a 2010 population of 53,380. It is a principal city of the Auburn-Opelika Metropolitan Area...

    , for their published report "The Effect of Country Music on Suicide".
  • Peace – Presented to Daisuke Inoue
    Daisuke Inoue
    is a Japanese businessman best known as the inventor of the karaoke machine. Inoue, a musician in his youth employed in backing businesspeople who wanted to sing in bars, invented the machine as a means of allowing them to sing without live back-up...

     of Hyōgo Prefecture
    Hyogo Prefecture
    is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region on Honshū island. The capital is Kobe.The prefecture's name was previously alternately spelled as Hiogo.- History :...

    , Japan
    Japan
    Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

    , for inventing karaoke
    Karaoke
    is a form of interactive entertainment or video game in which amateur singers sing along with recorded music using a microphone and public address system. The music is typically a well-known pop song minus the lead vocal. Lyrics are usually displayed on a video screen, along with a moving symbol,...

    , thereby providing an entirely new way for people to learn to tolerate each other.
  • Physics – Presented jointly to Ramesh Balasubramaniam of the University of Ottawa
    University of Ottawa
    The University of Ottawa is a bilingual, research-intensive, non-denominational, international university in Ottawa, Ontario. It is one of the oldest universities in Canada. It was originally established as the College of Bytown in 1848 by the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate...

    , and Michael Turvey of the University of Connecticut
    University of Connecticut
    The admission rate to the University of Connecticut is about 50% and has been steadily decreasing, with about 28,000 prospective students applying for admission to the freshman class in recent years. Approximately 40,000 prospective students tour the main campus in Storrs annually...

     and Haskins Laboratory, for exploring and explaining the dynamics of hula-hooping
    Hula hoop
    A hula hoop is a toy hoop that is twirled around the waist, limbs or neck.Although the exact origins of hula hoops are unknown, children and adults around the world have played with hoops, twirling, rolling and throwing them throughout history...

    .
  • Psychology – Presented jointly to Daniel Simons of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
    University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
    The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign is a large public research-intensive university in the state of Illinois, United States. It is the flagship campus of the University of Illinois system...

     and Christopher Chabris of Harvard University
    Harvard University
    Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...

    , for demonstrating that when people pay close attention to something, it's all too easy to overlook anything else – even a woman in a gorilla suit. (See inattentional blindness
    Inattentional blindness
    Inattentional blindness, also known as perceptual blindness, is when a person fails to notice some stimulus that is in plain sight. This stimulus is usually unexpected but fully visible. This typically happens because humans are overloaded with inputs. It is impossible to pay attention to every...

    ).
  • Public Health – Presented to Jillian Clarke of the Chicago High School for Agricultural Sciences
    Chicago High School for Agricultural Sciences
    The Chicago High School for Agricultural Sciences is a public secondary magnet school opened in 1985 by the Chicago Public Schools as a unique, experimental high school devoted to teaching agricultural science to urban students...

    , and then Howard University
    Howard University
    Howard University is a federally chartered, non-profit, private, coeducational, nonsectarian, historically black university located in Washington, D.C., United States...

    , for investigating the scientific validity of the five-second rule
    Five-second rule
    A common superstition, the five-second rule states that food dropped on the ground will not be contaminated with bacteria if it is picked up within five seconds of being dropped...

     about whether it's safe to eat food that's been dropped on the floor.

2005

  • Agricultural History – Presented to James Watson of Massey University
    Massey University
    Massey University is one of New Zealand's largest universities with approximately 36,000 students, 20,000 of whom are extramural students.The University has campuses in Palmerston North , Wellington and Auckland . Massey offers most of its degrees extramurally within New Zealand and internationally...

    , New Zealand
    New Zealand
    New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

    , for his scholarly study, "The Significance of Mr. Richard Buckley's Exploding Trousers
    Exploding trousers
    In New Zealand in the 1930s, farmers reportedly had trouble with exploding trousers as a result of attempts to wipe out the weed ragwort.Farmers had been spraying sodium chlorate, a government recommended weedkiller, onto the ragwort, and some of the spray had ended up on their clothes. Sodium...

    ".
  • Biology – Presented jointly to Benjamin Smith of the University of Adelaide
    University of Adelaide
    The University of Adelaide is a public university located in Adelaide, South Australia. Established in 1874, it is the third oldest university in Australia...

    , Australia
    Australia
    Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

     and the University of Toronto
    University of Toronto
    The University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...

    , Canada
    Canada
    Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

     and the Firmenich perfume company, Geneva
    Geneva
    Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...

    , Switzerland
    Switzerland
    Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

    , and ChemComm Enterprises, Archamps, France; Craig Williams of James Cook University
    James Cook University
    James Cook University is a public university based in Townsville, Queensland, Australia. The university has two Australian campuses, located in Townsville and Cairns respectively, and an international campus in Singapore. JCU is the second oldest university in Queensland—proclaimed in 1970—and the...

     and the University of South Australia
    University of South Australia
    The University of South Australia is a public university in the Australian state of South Australia. It was formed in 1991 with the merger of the South Australian Institute of Technology and Colleges of Advanced Education. It is the largest university in South Australia, with more than 36,000...

    ; Michael Tyler of the University of Adelaide; Brian Williams of the University of Adelaide; and Yoji Hayasaka of the Australian Wine Research Institute; for painstakingly smelling and cataloging the peculiar odors produced by 131 different species of frogs when the frogs were feeling stressed.
  • Chemistry – Presented jointly to Edward Cussler
    Edward Cussler
    Edward Cussler is a professor of chemical engineering at the University of Minnesota. He is known for his research in fluid mechanics, mass transport, and novel chemical and biological separations....

     of the University of Minnesota
    University of Minnesota
    The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university located in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is the oldest and largest part of the University of Minnesota system and has the fourth-largest main campus student body in the United States, with 52,557...

     and Brian Gettelfinger of the University of Minnesota and the University of Wisconsin–Madison
    University of Wisconsin–Madison
    The University of Wisconsin–Madison is a public research university located in Madison, Wisconsin, United States. Founded in 1848, UW–Madison is the flagship campus of the University of Wisconsin System. It became a land-grant institution in 1866...

    , for conducting a careful experiment to settle the longstanding scientific question: can people swim faster in syrup
    Syrup
    In cooking, a syrup is a thick, viscous liquid consisting primarily of a solution of sugar in water, containing a large amount of dissolved sugars but showing little tendency to deposit crystals...

     or in water
    Water
    Water is a chemical substance with the chemical formula H2O. A water molecule contains one oxygen and two hydrogen atoms connected by covalent bonds. Water is a liquid at ambient conditions, but it often co-exists on Earth with its solid state, ice, and gaseous state . Water also exists in a...

    ? It was found that swimmers in the experiment reach comparable velocity in both media.
  • Economics – Presented to Gauri Nanda of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
    Massachusetts Institute of Technology
    The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...

    , for inventing Clocky
    Clocky
    Clocky is a brand of alarm clock outfitted with wheels, allowing it to hide itself in order to force the owner awake in an attempt to find it. Invented for an industrial design class by Gauri Nanda, then a graduate student at MIT Media Lab, Clocky won the 2005 Ig Nobel Prize in Economics...

    , an alarm clock that runs away and hides, repeatedly, thus ensuring that people get out of bed, and thus theoretically adding many productive hours to the workday.
  • Fluid Dynamics – Presented jointly to Victor Benno Meyer-Rochow of International University Bremen
    International University Bremen
    Jacobs University Bremen is a highly selective, top-ranked, private, independent research university in Bremen, Germany.Jacobs University is an English-speaking higher education institution...

    , Germany
    Germany
    Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

     and the University of Oulu
    University of Oulu
    The University of Oulu is one of the largest universities in Finland, located in the city of Oulu. It was founded on July 8, 1958. The university has around 16,000 students and 3,000 staff...

    , Finland
    Finland
    Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...

    ; and József Gál of Loránd Eötvös University, Hungary
    Hungary
    Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...

    , for using basic principles of physics to calculate the pressure that builds up inside a penguin
    Penguin
    Penguins are a group of aquatic, flightless birds living almost exclusively in the southern hemisphere, especially in Antarctica. Highly adapted for life in the water, penguins have countershaded dark and white plumage, and their wings have become flippers...

    , as detailed in their report "Pressures Produced When Penguins Poo—Calculations on Avian Defecation".
  • Literature – Presented to the Internet entrepreneurs of Nigeria
    Nigeria
    Nigeria , officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal constitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic of Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in...

    , for creating and then using e-mail to distribute a bold series of short stories, thus introducing millions of readers to a cast of rich characters—General Sani Abacha
    Sani Abacha
    General Sani Abacha was a Nigerian military leader and politician. A Kanuri from Borno by tribe, he was born and brought up in Kano, Nigeria. He was the de facto President of Nigeria from 1993 to 1998....

    , Mrs. Mariam Sanni Abacha
    Maryam Abacha
    Maryam Abacha is the widow of Sani Abacha, de facto President of Nigeria from 1993 to 1998.After the death of Sani Abacha in June 1998, Maryam Abacha attempted to leave Nigeria with suitcases filled with money. She was arrested, placed on 24-hour surveillance, and banned from leaving Nigeria...

    , Barrister Jon A Mbeki Esq., and others—each of whom requires just a small amount of expense money so as to obtain access to the great wealth to which they are entitled and which they would like to share with the kind person who assists them. (See advance fee fraud
    Advance fee fraud
    An advance-fee fraud is a confidence trick in which the target is persuaded to advance sums of money in the hope of realizing a significantly larger gain...

    .)
  • Medicine – Presented to Gregg A. Miller of Oak Grove, Missouri
    Missouri
    Missouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...

    , for inventing Neuticles
    Neuticles
    Neuticles are prosthetic testicular implants for neutered dogs and other domestic animals. Creator Gregg Miller won the 2005 Ig Nobel Prize in Medicine, a parody of the real Nobel Prize, for his invention. As of September 2007, more than 240,000 pairs of the patented product had been sold, in all...

    —artificial replacement testicles for dogs, which are available in three sizes, and three degrees of firmness.
  • Nutrition – Presented to Dr. Yoshiro Nakamatsu
    Yoshiro Nakamatsu
    , also known as , is an eccentric Japanese inventor who has become something of a minor celebrity for his amusing inventions. He regularly appears on Japanese talk shows which, in conjunction with his appearance, usually craft a humorous segment based on one or more of his inventions.He is a...

     of Tokyo
    Tokyo
    , ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...

    , Japan
    Japan
    Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

    , for photographing and retrospectively analyzing every meal he has consumed during a period of 34 years (and counting).
  • Peace – Presented jointly to Claire Rind and Peter Simmons of University of Newcastle
    University of Newcastle upon Tyne
    Newcastle University is a major research-intensive university located in Newcastle upon Tyne in the north-east of England. It was established as a School of Medicine and Surgery in 1834 and became the University of Newcastle upon Tyne by an Act of Parliament in August 1963. Newcastle University is...

    , in the UK, for electrically monitoring the activity of a brain cell in a locust
    Locust
    Locusts are the swarming phase of short-horned grasshoppers of the family Acrididae. These are species that can breed rapidly under suitable conditions and subsequently become gregarious and migratory...

     while that locust was watching selected highlights from the movie Star Wars
    Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope
    Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, originally released as Star Wars, is a 1977 American epic space opera film, written and directed by George Lucas. It is the first of six films released in the Star Wars saga: two subsequent films complete the original trilogy, while a prequel trilogy completes the...

    .
  • Physics – Presented jointly to John Mainstone and Thomas Parnell
    Thomas Parnell (scientist)
    Thomas Parnell was the first Professor of Physics at the University of Queensland. He started the famous pitch drop experiment there....

     of the University of Queensland
    University of Queensland
    The University of Queensland, also known as UQ, is a public university located in state of Queensland, Australia. Founded in 1909, it is the oldest and largest university in Queensland and the fifth oldest in the nation...

    , Australia
    Australia
    Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

    , for patiently conducting the so-called pitch drop experiment
    Pitch drop experiment
    The pitch drop experiment is a long-term experiment which measures the flow of a piece of pitch over many years. Pitch is the name for any of a number of highly viscous liquids which appear solid, most commonly bitumen...

     that began in the year 1927—in which a glob of congealed black tar pitch
    Pitch (resin)
    Pitch is the name for any of a number of viscoelastic, solid polymers. Pitch can be made from petroleum products or plants. Petroleum-derived pitch is also called bitumen. Pitch produced from plants is also known as resin. Products made from plant resin are also known as rosin.Pitch was...

     has been slowly dripping through a funnel, at a rate of approximately one drop every nine years.

2006

  • Acoustics: D. Lynn Halpern of Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates, and Brandeis University
    Brandeis University
    Brandeis University is an American private research university with a liberal arts focus. It is located in the southwestern corner of Waltham, Massachusetts, nine miles west of Boston. The University has an enrollment of approximately 3,200 undergraduate and 2,100 graduate students. In 2011, it...

    , and Northwestern University
    Northwestern University
    Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....

    , Randolph Blake of Vanderbilt University
    Vanderbilt University
    Vanderbilt University is a private research university located in Nashville, Tennessee, United States. Founded in 1873, the university is named for shipping and rail magnate "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt, who provided Vanderbilt its initial $1 million endowment despite having never been to the...

     and Northwestern University
    Northwestern University
    Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....

     and James Hillenbrand of Western Michigan University
    Western Michigan University
    Western Michigan University is a public university located in Kalamazoo, Michigan, United States. The university was established in 1903 by Dwight B. Waldo, and as of the Fall 2010 semester, its enrollment is 25,045....

     and Northwestern University
    Northwestern University
    Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....

     for conducting experiments to learn why people dislike the sound of fingernails scraping chalkboard
    Sound of fingernails scraping chalkboard
    Scraping a chalkboard with the fingernails produces a sound which most people find unpleasant. The basis of this innate reaction has been studied in the field of psychoacoustics.-The primate heritage hypothesis:...

    .
  • Biology: Bart Knols of Wageningen Agricultural University, in Wageningen
    Wageningen
    ' is a municipality and a historical town in the central Netherlands, in the province of Gelderland. It is famous for Wageningen University, which specializes in life sciences. The city has 37,414 inhabitants , of which many thousands are students...

    , the Netherlands
    Netherlands
    The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

    ; and of the National Institute for Medical Research / Ifakara Centre, Tanzania
    Tanzania
    The United Republic of Tanzania is a country in East Africa bordered by Kenya and Uganda to the north, Rwanda, Burundi, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west, and Zambia, Malawi, and Mozambique to the south. The country's eastern borders lie on the Indian Ocean.Tanzania is a state...

    , and of the International Atomic Energy Agency
    International Atomic Energy Agency
    The International Atomic Energy Agency is an international organization that seeks to promote the peaceful use of nuclear energy, and to inhibit its use for any military purpose, including nuclear weapons. The IAEA was established as an autonomous organization on 29 July 1957...

    , in Vienna
    Vienna
    Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...

    , Austria
    Austria
    Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

    ) and Ruurd de Jong of Wageningen Agricultural University and of Santa Maria degli Angeli
    Santa Maria degli Angeli
    Santa Maria degli Angeli is the name of several churches in Italy. They include:*Santa Maria degli Angeli e dei Martiri, a basilica in Rome, created by Michelangelo in the Baths of Diocletian...

    , Italy
    Italy
    Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

     for showing that the female malaria
    Malaria
    Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease of humans and other animals caused by eukaryotic protists of the genus Plasmodium. The disease results from the multiplication of Plasmodium parasites within red blood cells, causing symptoms that typically include fever and headache, in severe cases...

     mosquito
    Mosquito
    Mosquitoes are members of a family of nematocerid flies: the Culicidae . The word Mosquito is from the Spanish and Portuguese for little fly...

     Anopheles gambiae
    Anopheles gambiae
    Anopheles gambiae is a complex of at least seven morphologically distinguishable species of mosquitoes in the genus Anopheles. This complex was recognised in the 1960s and includes the most important vectors of malaria in sub-Saharan Africa and the most efficient malaria vectors known.This species...

    is attracted equally to the smell of limburger cheese
    Limburger cheese
    Limburger is a cheese that originated during the 19th century in the historical Duchy of Limburg, which is now divided among modern-day Belgium, Germany, and Netherlands. The cheese is especially known for its pungent odor commonly compared to body odor....

     and to the smell of human feet.
  • Chemistry: Antonio Mulet, José Javier Benedito and José Bon of the Polytechnic University of Valencia
    Polytechnic University of Valencia
    The Polytechnic University of Valencia is a Spanish university located in Valencia, with a focus on science and technology. It was founded in 1968 as the Higher Polytechnic School of Valencia and became a university in 1971, but some of its schools are more than 100 years old.- Characteristics...

    , Spain
    Spain
    Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

    , and Carmen Rosselló of the University of Illes Balears, in Palma de Mallorca
    Palma de Mallorca
    Palma is the major city and port on the island of Majorca and capital city of the autonomous community of the Balearic Islands in Spain. The names Ciutat de Mallorca and Ciutat were used before the War of the Spanish Succession and are still used by people in Majorca. However, the official name...

    , Spain, for their study "Ultrasonic Velocity in Cheddar Cheese as Affected by Temperature".
  • Literature: Daniel M. Oppenheimer
    Daniel M. Oppenheimer
    Daniel M. Oppenheimer is an associate professor of psychology at Princeton University's Department of Psychology. Primarily interested in cognitive psychology, he researches causal discounting, charitable giving, perceptual fluency, and people's perceptions of randomness...

     of Princeton University
    Princeton University
    Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....

     for his report "Consequences of Erudite Vernacular Utilized Irrespective of Necessity: Problems with Using Long Words Needlessly".
  • Mathematics: Nic Svenson and Piers Barnes of the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation
    Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation
    The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation is the national government body for scientific research in Australia...

    , for calculating the number of photographs that must be taken to (almost) ensure that nobody in a group photo will have their eyes closed.
  • Medicine: Francis M. Fesmire
    Francis M. Fesmire
    Francis Miller Fesmire is an American emergency physician and a nationally recognized expert in myocardial infarction. He has authored numerous academic articles and has assisted in the development of clinical guidelines on the standard of care in treating patients with suspected myocardial...

     of the University of Tennessee College of Medicine
    University of Tennessee College of Medicine
    The University of Tennessee College of Medicine is one of six graduate schools of the University of Tennessee Health Science Center in downtown Memphis...

    , for his medical case report "Termination of Intractable Hiccups with Digital Rectal Massage";
  • Nutrition: Wasmia Al-Houty of Kuwait University
    Kuwait University
    Kuwait University was established in October 1966, five years after Kuwait's independence from British Colonization. KU started with only two faculties, namely the Faculty of Science, Arts and Education; and a Women's College. The university had 418 students enrolled and 31 faculty members. By ,...

     and Faten Al-Mussalam of the Kuwait Environment Public Authority, for showing that dung beetle
    Dung beetle
    Dung beetles are beetles that feed partly or exclusively on feces. All of these species belong to the superfamily Scarabaeoidea; most of them to the subfamilies Scarabaeinae and Aphodiinae of the family Scarabaeidae. This beetle can also be referred to as the scarab beetle. As most species of...

    s are finicky eaters.
  • Ornithology: Ivan R. Schwab
    Ivan R. Schwab
    Ivan Roy Schwab is a professor of ophthalmology at the University of California Davis School of Medicine.Dr. Schwab completed his undergraduate degree at West Virginia University and received his M.D. from the West Virginia University School of Medicine. Dr...

    , of the University of California, Davis
    University of California, Davis
    The University of California, Davis is a public teaching and research university established in 1905 and located in Davis, California, USA. Spanning over , the campus is the largest within the University of California system and third largest by enrollment...

    , and Philip R.A. May of the University of California, Los Angeles
    University of California, Los Angeles
    The University of California, Los Angeles is a public research university located in the Westwood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, USA. It was founded in 1919 as the "Southern Branch" of the University of California and is the second oldest of the ten campuses...

    , for exploring and explaining why woodpecker
    Woodpecker
    Woodpeckers are near passerine birds of the order Piciformes. They are one subfamily in the family Picidae, which also includes the piculets and wrynecks. They are found worldwide and include about 180 species....

    s don't get headache
    Headache
    A headache or cephalalgia is pain anywhere in the region of the head or neck. It can be a symptom of a number of different conditions of the head and neck. The brain tissue itself is not sensitive to pain because it lacks pain receptors. Rather, the pain is caused by disturbance of the...

    s.
  • Peace: Howard Stapleton of Merthyr Tydfil
    Merthyr Tydfil
    Merthyr Tydfil is a town in Wales, with a population of about 30,000. Although once the largest town in Wales, it is now ranked as the 15th largest urban area in Wales. It also gives its name to a county borough, which has a population of around 55,000. It is located in the historic county of...

    , Wales
    Wales
    Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...

    , for inventing an electromechanical teenager repellant
    The Mosquito
    The Mosquito or Mosquito alarm is an electronic device, used to deter loitering by young people, which emits a sound with a very high frequency...

     – a device that makes annoying high-pitched noise designed to be audible to teenagers but not to adults; and for later using that same technology to make telephone
    Telephone
    The telephone , colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that transmits and receives sounds, usually the human voice. Telephones are a point-to-point communication system whose most basic function is to allow two people separated by large distances to talk to each other...

     ringtones that are audible to teenagers but probably not to their teacher
    Teacher
    A teacher or schoolteacher is a person who provides education for pupils and students . The role of teacher is often formal and ongoing, carried out at a school or other place of formal education. In many countries, a person who wishes to become a teacher must first obtain specified professional...

    s.
  • Physics: Basile Audoly and Sebastien Neukirch of the Université Pierre et Marie Curie, for their analysis that explains why uncooked spaghetti breaks into several pieces when it is bent.

2007

  • Aviation: Patricia V. Agostino, Santiago A. Plano and Diego A. Golombek, for discovering that hamsters recover from jetlag more quickly when given Viagra.
  • Biology: Johanna E.M.H. van Bronswijk, for taking a census of all the mites
    MITES
    MITES, or Minority Introduction to Engineering and Science, is a highly selective six-week summer program for rising high school seniors held at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Its purpose is to expose students from minority, or otherwise disadvantaged backgrounds, to the fields of...

     and other life forms that live in people's beds.
  • Chemistry: Mayu Yamamoto for extracting vanilla flavour
    Vanillin
    Vanillin is a phenolic aldehyde, an organic compound with the molecular formula C8H8O3. Its functional groups include aldehyde, ether, and phenol. It is the primary component of the extract of the vanilla bean. It is also found in Leptotes bicolor, roasted coffee and the Chinese red pine...

     from cow dung.
  • Economics: Kuo Cheng Hsieh, for patenting a device to catch bank robbers by ensnaring them in a net.
  • Linguistics: Juan Manuel Toro, Josep B. Trobalon and Nuria Sebastian-Galles, for determining that rats sometimes can't distinguish between recordings of Japanese
    Japanese language
    is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...

     and Dutch
    Dutch language
    Dutch is a West Germanic language and the native language of the majority of the population of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Suriname, the three member states of the Dutch Language Union. Most speakers live in the European Union, where it is a first language for about 23 million and a second...

     played backward.
  • Literature: Glenda Browne, for her study into indexing entries that start with the definitive article
    THE
    THE is a three-letter acronym that may refer to:*Technische Hogeschool Eindhoven , a Dutch university of technology...

     "the".
  • Medicine: Dan Meyer
    Dan Meyer (performer)
    Dan Meyer is an American performance artist, corporate entertainer, inspirational/motivational speaker, and professional sword swallower best known for swallowing swords underwater in a tank of sharks and stingrays...

     and Brian Witcombe, for investigating the side-effects of swallowing swords
    Sword swallowing
    Sword swallowing is an ancient performance art in which the performer passes a sword through the mouth and down the esophagus towards the stomach...

    .
  • Nutrition: Brian Wansink
    Brian Wansink
    Brian Wansink is an American professor in the fields of consumer behavior and nutritional science. He is a former Executive Director of the USDA's Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion ....

    , for investigating people's appetite for mindless eating
    Mindless Eating
    Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think is a nonfiction book by Cornell University consumer behavior professor Brian Wansink. Based upon award-winning research discoveries at the Cornell Food and Brand Lab, the book was cited by the National Action Against Obesity as being a 2006 hero in...

     by secretly feeding them a self-refilling bowl of soup.
  • Peace: The United States Air Force
    United States Air Force
    The United States Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on September 18, 1947 under the National Security Act of...

     Wright Laboratory in Dayton, Ohio
    Wright-Patterson Air Force Base
    Wright-Patterson Air Force Base is a United States Air Force base in Greene and Montgomery counties in the state of Ohio. It includes both Wright and Patterson Fields, which were originally Wilbur Wright Field and Fairfield Aviation General Supply Depot. Patterson Field is located approximately...

    , for suggesting the research and development of a "gay bomb
    Gay bomb
    The "halitosis bomb" and "gay bomb" are informal names for two theoretical non-lethal chemical weapons, which a United States Air Force research laboratory speculated about producing, which involved discharging female sex pheromones over enemy forces in order to make them sexually attracted to each...

    ," which would cause enemy troops to become sexually attracted to each other.
  • Physics: L. Mahadevan and Enrique Cerda Villablanca for their theoretical study of how sheets become wrinkled.

2008

The "18th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony" was held on 2 October 2008 at Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...

's Sanders Theatre.
  • Archaeology: Astolfo Gomes de Mello Araujo and Jose Carlos Marcelino, for showing that armadillo
    Armadillo
    Armadillos are New World placental mammals, known for having a leathery armor shell. Dasypodidae is the only surviving family in the order Cingulata, part of the superorder Xenarthra along with the anteaters and sloths. The word armadillo is Spanish for "little armored one"...

    s can mix up the contents of an archaeological site
    Archaeological site
    An archaeological site is a place in which evidence of past activity is preserved , and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology and represents a part of the archaeological record.Beyond this, the definition and geographical extent of a 'site' can vary widely,...

    .
  • Biology: Marie-Christine Cadiergues, Christel Joubert, and Michel Franc, for discovering that flea
    Flea
    Flea is the common name for insects of the order Siphonaptera which are wingless insects with mouthparts adapted for piercing skin and sucking blood...

    s that live on dogs jump higher than fleas that live on cats.
  • Chemistry: Sheree Umpierre, Joseph Hill, and Deborah Anderson, for discovering that Coca-Cola
    Coca-Cola
    Coca-Cola is a carbonated soft drink sold in stores, restaurants, and vending machines in more than 200 countries. It is produced by The Coca-Cola Company of Atlanta, Georgia, and is often referred to simply as Coke...

     is an effective spermicide
    Spermicide
    Spermicide is a contraceptive substance that eradicates sperm, inserted vaginally prior to intercourse to prevent pregnancy. As a contraceptive, spermicide may be used alone. However, the pregnancy rate experienced by couples using only spermicide is higher than that of couples using other methods...

    , and C.Y. Hong, C.C. Shieh, P. Wu, and B.N. Chiang for accidentally proving it is not.
  • Cognitive science: Toshiyuki Nakagaki, Hiroyasu Yamada, Ryo Kobayashi, Atsushi Tero, Akio Ishiguro, and Ágota Tóth, for discovering that slime molds can solve puzzles
    Problem solving
    Problem solving is a mental process and is part of the larger problem process that includes problem finding and problem shaping. Consideredthe most complex of all intellectual functions, problem solving has been defined as higher-order cognitive process that requires the modulation and control of...

    .
  • Economics: Geoffrey Miller
    Geoffrey Miller (evolutionary psychologist)
    Geoffrey F. Miller , Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of New Mexico, is an American evolutionary psychologist.Miller is a 1987 graduate of Columbia University, where he earned a B.A. in biology and psychology. He received his PhD in cognitive psychology from Stanford University...

    , Joshua Tyber, and Brent Jordan, for discovering that exotic dancer
    Exotic dancer
    The terms exotic dancer and exotic dance can have different meanings in different parts of the world and depending on context. In the erotic sense, "exotic dance" is a often used to refer to practitioners of striptease...

    s earn more when at peak fertility
    Fertility
    Fertility is the natural capability of producing offsprings. As a measure, "fertility rate" is the number of children born per couple, person or population. Fertility differs from fecundity, which is defined as the potential for reproduction...

    .
  • Literature: David Sims, for his study "You Bastard: A Narrative Exploration of the Experience of Indignation within Organizations".
  • Medicine: Rebecca Waber and Dan Ariely
    Dan Ariely
    Dan Ariely is an Israeli American professor of psychology and behavioral economics. He teaches at Duke University and is the founder of The Center for Advanced Hindsight.-Biography:...

     for demonstrating that expensive placebo
    Placebo
    A placebo is a simulated or otherwise medically ineffectual treatment for a disease or other medical condition intended to deceive the recipient...

    s are more effective than inexpensive placebos.
  • Nutrition: Massimiliano Zampini and Charles Spence
    Charles Spence
    Prof. Charles Spence is an experimental psychologist at the University of Oxford. He is the head of the Crossmodal Research group which specializes in the research about the integration of information across different sensory modalities. He also teaches Experimental Psychology to undergraduates at...

    , for demonstrating that food tastes better when it sounds more appealing.
  • Peace: The Swiss Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology and the citizens of Switzerland, for adopting the legal principle that plants have dignity
    Dignity
    Dignity is a term used in moral, ethical, and political discussions to signify that a being has an innate right to respect and ethical treatment. It is an extension of the Enlightenment-era concepts of inherent, inalienable rights...

    .
  • Physics: Dorian Raymer and Douglas Smith, for proving that heaps of string or hair will inevitably tangle.

2009

  • Biology: Fumiaki Taguchi, Song Guofu, and Zhang Guanglei of Kitasato University
    Kitasato University
    is one of the famous private university in Minato, Tokyo, Japan.The head of the university is located in the Shirokane Campus, neighboring the Kitasato Institute. Its major educational facilities are located in the Sagamihara Campus, located 60 kilometers west of central Tokyo...

     Graduate School of Medical Sciences in Sagamihara, Japan, for demonstrating that kitchen refuse can be reduced more than 90% in mass by using bacteria extracted from the feces of giant pandas.
  • Chemistry: Javier Morales, Miguel Apatiga, and Victor M. Castano of Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico
    National Autonomous University of Mexico
    The Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México is a university in Mexico. UNAM was founded on 22 September 1910 by Justo Sierra as a liberal alternative to the Roman Catholic-sponsored Royal and Pontifical University of Mexico The Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) (National Autonomous...

    , for creating diamond film
    Diamond Film
    The Diamond Film is a film award recognising domestic box office achievements in the Netherlands. The Diamond Film is awarded to films from the Netherlands once they have sold 1,000,000 cinema tickets or more during the original circulation...

     from tequila
    Tequila
    Tequila is a spirit made from the blue agave plant, primarily in the area surrounding the city of Tequila, northwest of Guadalajara, and in the highlands of the western Mexican state of Jalisco....

    .
  • Economics: The directors, executives, and auditors of four Icelandic banks—Kaupthing Bank
    Kaupthing Bank
    Kaupthing Bank was an international Icelandic bank, headquartered in Reykjavík, Iceland. It was formed by the merger of Kaupthing and Búnaðarbanki Íslands in 2003 and was the largest bank in Iceland....

    , Landsbanki
    Landsbanki
    Landsbanki, also commonly known as Landsbankinn in Iceland, is a private Icelandic bank with international operations...

    , Glitnir Bank, and Central Bank of Iceland
    Central Bank of Iceland
    The Central Bank of Iceland is the central bank or reserve bank of Iceland. It has served in this capacity since 1961, when it was created by an act of the Alþingi out of the central banking department of Landsbanki Íslands, which had had the sole right of note issuance since 1927 and had...

    —for demonstrating that tiny banks can be rapidly transformed into huge banks, and vice versa (and for demonstrating that similar things can be done to an entire national economy).
  • Literature: Ireland's police service
    Garda Síochána
    , more commonly referred to as the Gardaí , is the police force of Ireland. The service is headed by the Commissioner who is appointed by the Irish Government. Its headquarters are located in the Phoenix Park in Dublin.- Terminology :...

     for writing and presenting more than 50 traffic tickets to a Polish
    Poles
    thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...

     individual, by the name of "Prawo Jazdy". Mr. "Jazdy" was widely thought to be the most frequent driving offender in Ireland, until an investigation uncovered the fact that Prawo Jazdy is the Polish term for "Driving License".
  • Mathematics: Gideon Gono
    Gideon Gono
    Gideon Gono is the current Governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe and former CEO of the Jewel Bank, formerly known as the Commercial Bank of Zimbabwe...

    , governor of Zimbabwe's Reserve Bank
    Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe
    The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe is the central bank of Zimbabwe.-History:The bank traces its history to the Bank of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, founded in March 1956, which in turn was the successor to the Central Currency Board....

    , for giving people a simple, everyday way to cope with a wide range of numbers by having his bank print notes with denominations ranging from one cent to one hundred trillion dollars
    Hyperinflation in Zimbabwe
    Hyperinflation in Zimbabwe began shortly after destruction of productive capacity in Zimbabwe's civil war and confiscation of white-owned farmland. Food output capacity fell 45%, manufacturing output 29% in 2005, 26% in 2006 and 28% in 2007, and unemployment rose to 80%...

    .
  • Medicine: Donald L. Unger of Thousand Oaks, California, US, for investigating a possible cause of arthritis of the fingers, by diligently cracking the knuckles
    Cracking joints
    Cracking joints is the action of moving joints to produce a sharp cracking or popping sound. The most common form of this occurs during deliberate knuckle-cracking...

     of his left hand but not his right hand every day for 50 years.
  • Peace: Stephan Bolliger, Steffen Ross, Lars Oesterhelweg, Michael Thali, and Beat Kneubuehl of the University of Bern, Switzerland, for determining whether it is better to be hit on the head with a full bottle of beer or with an empty bottle.
  • Physics: Katherine K. Whitcome of the University of Cincinnati
    University of Cincinnati
    The University of Cincinnati is a comprehensive public research university in Cincinnati, Ohio, and a part of the University System of Ohio....

    , Daniel E Lieberman of Harvard University
    Harvard University
    Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...

    , and Liza J. Shapiro of the University of Texas, all in the US, for analytically determining why pregnant women do not tip over.
  • Public Health: Elena N. Bodnar, Raphael C. Lee, and Sandra Marijan of Chicago, US, for inventing a bra
    Bra
    Bra may refer to:-Places:Italy* Bra, Piedmont, a comune in the Province of Cuneo, Piedmont* Piazza Bra, a piazza in VeronaUnited States* Brattleboro , a rail station in Windham County, Vermont-Other uses:...

     that can be quickly converted into a pair of gas masks—one for the wearer and one to be given to a needy bystander.
  • Veterinary medicine: Catherine Douglas and Peter Rowlinson of Newcastle University, UK, for showing that cows with names give more milk than cows that are nameless.

2010

  • Biology: Libiao Zhang, Min Tan, Guangjian Zhu, Jianping Ye, Tiyu Hong, Shanyi Zhou, and Shuyi Zhang of China, and Gareth Jones of the University of Bristol
    University of Bristol
    The University of Bristol is a public research university located in Bristol, United Kingdom. One of the so-called "red brick" universities, it received its Royal Charter in 1909, although its predecessor institution, University College, Bristol, had been in existence since 1876.The University is...

    , UK, for scientifically documenting fellatio
    Fellatio
    Fellatio is an act of oral stimulation of a male's penis by a sexual partner. It involves the stimulation of the penis by the use of the mouth, tongue, or throat. The person who performs fellatio can be referred to as the giving partner, and the other person is the receiving partner...

     in fruit bat
    Fruit Bat
    Fruit Bat can refer to:* Megabats, a species of bat which eats fruit* Les "Fruitbat" Carter, guitarist of Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine* Fruit Bats , an American band...

    s.
  • Chemistry: Eric Adams, Scott Socolofsky, Stephen Masutani and BP
    BP
    BP p.l.c. is a global oil and gas company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It is the third-largest energy company and fourth-largest company in the world measured by revenues and one of the six oil and gas "supermajors"...

    , for disproving the old belief
    Deepwater Horizon oil spill
    The Deepwater Horizon oil spill is an oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico which flowed unabated for three months in 2010, and continues to leak fresh oil. It is the largest accidental marine oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry...

     that oil and water
    Oil and Water
    Oil and Water may refer to:* a mixture of oil and water * "Oil and Water" , a 2007 single by American alternative rock band Incubus* Oil & Water, a 2003 EP by New Zealand rock band Evermore...

     don't mix.
  • Economics: The executives and directors of Goldman Sachs
    Goldman Sachs
    The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. is an American multinational bulge bracket investment banking and securities firm that engages in global investment banking, securities, investment management, and other financial services primarily with institutional clients...

    , AIG
    American International Group
    American International Group, Inc. or AIG is an American multinational insurance corporation. Its corporate headquarters is located in the American International Building in New York City. The British headquarters office is on Fenchurch Street in London, continental Europe operations are based in...

    , Lehman Brothers
    Lehman Brothers
    Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. was a global financial services firm. Before declaring bankruptcy in 2008, Lehman was the fourth largest investment bank in the USA , doing business in investment banking, equity and fixed-income sales and trading Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. (former NYSE ticker...

    , Bear Stearns
    Bear Stearns
    The Bear Stearns Companies, Inc. based in New York City, was a global investment bank and securities trading and brokerage, until its sale to JPMorgan Chase in 2008 during the global financial crisis and recession...

    , Merrill Lynch
    Merrill Lynch
    Merrill Lynch is the wealth management division of Bank of America. With over 15,000 financial advisors and $2.2 trillion in client assets it is the world's largest brokerage. Formerly known as Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc., prior to 2009 the firm was publicly owned and traded on the New York...

    , and Magnetar
    Magnetar Capital
    Magnetar Capital is a hedge fund based in Evanston, Illinois. Among its many activities, the firm was actively involved in the collateralized debt obligation market during the 2006–2007 period...

     for creating and promoting new ways to invest money—ways that maximize financial gain and minimize financial risk for the world economy
    World economy
    The world economy, or global economy, generally refers to the economy, which is based on economies of all of the world's countries, national economies. Also global economy can be seen as the economy of global society and national economies – as economies of local societies, making the global one....

    , or for a portion thereof.
  • Engineering: Karina Acevedo-Whitehouse and Agnes Rocha-Gosselin of the Zoological Society of London
    Zoological Society of London
    The Zoological Society of London is a charity devoted to the worldwide conservation of animals and their habitats...

    , UK, and Diane Gendron of Instituto Politecnico Nacional, Baja California Sur, Mexico, for perfecting a method to collect whale
    Whale
    Whale is the common name for various marine mammals of the order Cetacea. The term whale sometimes refers to all cetaceans, but more often it excludes dolphins and porpoises, which belong to suborder Odontoceti . This suborder also includes the sperm whale, killer whale, pilot whale, and beluga...

     snot
    Mucus
    In vertebrates, mucus is a slippery secretion produced by, and covering, mucous membranes. Mucous fluid is typically produced from mucous cells found in mucous glands. Mucous cells secrete products that are rich in glycoproteins and water. Mucous fluid may also originate from mixed glands, which...

    , using a remote-control helicopter
    Radio-controlled helicopter
    Radio-controlled helicopters are model aircraft which are distinct from RC airplanes because of the differences in construction, aerodynamics, and flight training...

    .
  • Management: Alessandro Pluchino, Andrea Rapisarda, and Cesare Garofalo of the University of Catania, Italy, for demonstrating mathematically that organizations would become more efficient if they promoted people at random
    Peter Principle
    The Peter Principle states that "in a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence", meaning that employees tend to be promoted until they reach a position at which they cannot work competently. It was formulated by Dr. Laurence J...

    .
  • Medicine: Simon Rietveld of the University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands, and Ilja van Beest of Tilburg University, The Netherlands, for discovering that symptoms of asthma
    Asthma
    Asthma is the common chronic inflammatory disease of the airways characterized by variable and recurring symptoms, reversible airflow obstruction, and bronchospasm. Symptoms include wheezing, coughing, chest tightness, and shortness of breath...

     can be treated with a roller coaster
    Roller coaster
    The roller coaster is a popular amusement ride developed for amusement parks and modern theme parks. LaMarcus Adna Thompson patented the first coasters on January 20, 1885...

     ride.
  • Peace: Richard Stephens, John Atkins, and Andrew Kingston of Keele University
    Keele University
    Keele University is a campus university near Newcastle-under-Lyme in Staffordshire, England. Founded in 1949 as an experimental college dedicated to a broad curriculum and interdisciplinary study, Keele is most notable for pioneering the dual honours degree in Britain...

    , UK, for confirming the widely held belief that swearing
    Profanity
    Profanity is a show of disrespect, or a desecration or debasement of someone or something. Profanity can take the form of words, expressions, gestures, or other social behaviors that are socially constructed or interpreted as insulting, rude, vulgar, obscene, desecrating, or other forms.The...

     relieves pain.
  • Physics: Lianne Parkin, Sheila Williams, and Patricia Priest of the University of Otago
    University of Otago
    The University of Otago in Dunedin is New Zealand's oldest university with over 22,000 students enrolled during 2010.The university has New Zealand's highest average research quality and in New Zealand is second only to the University of Auckland in the number of A rated academic researchers it...

    , for demonstrating that, on icy footpath
    Footpath
    A Footpath is a thoroughfare intended for by pedestrians but not by motorized vehicles. The term is often for paths within an urban area that offer shorter quieter routes for pedestrians, they may also provide access to the surrounding countryside or parks...

    s in wintertime, people slip and fall less often if they wear socks on the outside of their shoes.
  • Public Health: Manuel Barbeito, Charles Mathews, and Larry Taylor of the Industrial Health and Safety Office, Fort Detrick
    Fort Detrick
    Fort Detrick is a U.S. Army Medical Command installation located in Frederick, Maryland, USA. Historically, Fort Detrick was the center for the United States' biological weapons program ....

     for determining by experiment that microbes cling to bearded scientists.
  • Transportation Planning: Toshiyuki Nakagaki, Atsushi Tero, Seiji Takagi, Tetsu Saigusa, Kentaro Ito, Kenji Yumiki, Ryo Kobayashi of Japan, and Dan Bebber, Mark Fricker of the UK, for using slime mold to determine the optimal routes for railroad tracks.

2011

  • Biology: Daryll Gwynne and David Rentz for discovering that certain kinds of beetle
    Julodimorpha
    Julodimorpha is a genus of beetles in the family Buprestidae, containing the following species:-Species:* Julodimorpha bakewellii * Julodimorpha saundersii Thomson, 1878-Observations on mating behaviour:...

     mate with certain kinds of Australian beer bottle.
  • Chemistry: Makoto Imai, Naoki Urushihata, Hideki Tanemura, Yukinobu Tajima, Hideaki Goto, Koichiro Mizoguchi and Junichi Murakami for determining the ideal density of airborne wasabi
    Wasabi
    , also known as Japanese horseradish, is a member of the Brassicaceae family, which includes cabbages, horseradish, and mustard. Its root is used as a condiment and has an extremely strong flavor. Its hotness is more akin to that of a hot mustard rather than the capsaicin in a chili pepper,...

     (pungent horseradish) to awaken sleeping people in case of a fire or other emergency, and for applying this knowledge to invent the wasabi alarm.
  • Literature: John Perry
    John Perry (philosopher)
    John R. Perry is Henry Waldgrave Stuart Professor of Philosophy at Stanford University. He has made significant contributions to areas of philosophy, including logic, philosophy of language, metaphysics, and philosophy of mind...

     of Stanford University
    Stanford University
    The Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University or Stanford, is a private research university on an campus located near Palo Alto, California. It is situated in the northwestern Santa Clara Valley on the San Francisco Peninsula, approximately northwest of San...

     for his Theory of Structured Procrastination, which states: "To be a high achiever, always work on something important, using it as a way to avoid doing something that's even more important."
  • Mathematics: Dorothy Martin
    When Prophecy Fails
    When Prophecy Fails is a 1956 classic book in social psychology by Leon Festinger, Henry Riecken, and Stanley Schachter about a UFO religion that believes the end of the world is at hand.- Cognitive dissonance :...

     of the USA (who predicted the world would end in 1954), Pat Robertson
    Pat Robertson
    Marion Gordon "Pat" Robertson is a media mogul, television evangelist, ex-Baptist minister and businessman who is politically aligned with the Christian Right in the United States....

     of the USA (who predicted the world would end in 1982), Elizabeth Clare Prophet
    Elizabeth Clare Prophet
    Elizabeth Clare Prophet was an American spiritual author and lecturer who was the leader of The Summit Lighthouse and Church Universal and Triumphant, a New Age religious movement which gained media attention in the late 1980s and early 1990s while preparing for potential nuclear disaster.During...

     of the USA (who predicted the world would end in 1990), Lee Jang Rim of Korea (who predicted the world would end in 1992), Credonia Mwerinde
    Credonia Mwerinde
    Credonia Mwerinde was the high priestess and co-founder of the Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God, a sect that splintered from the Roman Catholic Church in Uganda. Before founding the movement she was a shopkeeper, brewer of banana beer, and a prostitute. Mwerinde was also...

     of Uganda (who predicted the world would end in 1999), and Harold Camping
    Harold Camping
    Harold Egbert Camping is an American Christian radio broadcaster. He served as president of Family Radio, a California-based radio station group that broadcasts to more than 150 markets in the United States, since 1958. In 2011 he retired from active broadcasting following a stroke, but still...

     of the USA (who originally predicted the world would end on September 6, 1994, and later predicted that the world will end on May 21, 2011, which preceded his final prediction on October 21, 2011), for teaching the world to be careful when making mathematical assumptions and calculations.
  • Medicine: Mirjam Tuk, Debra Trampe and Luk Warlop, and jointly to Matthew Lewis, Peter Snyder, Robert Feldman, Robert Pietrzak, David Darby and Paul Maruff for demonstrating that people make better decisions about some kinds of things – but worse decisions about other kinds of things – when they have a strong urge to urinate.
  • Peace: Arturas Zuokas
    Arturas Zuokas
    Artūras Zuokas is a Lithuanian politician. He is former leader of the Liberal and Centre Union political party and the Mayor of Vilnius city municipality from 2000-2007 and from April 2011 onward. He was a member of the Seimas .Zuokas graduated from the secondary school of Jonava...

    , the mayor of Vilnius
    Vilnius
    Vilnius is the capital of Lithuania, and its largest city, with a population of 560,190 as of 2010. It is the seat of the Vilnius city municipality and of the Vilnius district municipality. It is also the capital of Vilnius County...

    , Lithuania
    Lithuania
    Lithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...

    , for demonstrating that the problem of illegally parked luxury cars can be solved by running over them with a tank
    Tank
    A tank is a tracked, armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat which combines operational mobility, tactical offensive, and defensive capabilities...

    .
  • Psychology: Karl Halvor Teigen of the University of Oslo
    University of Oslo
    The University of Oslo , formerly The Royal Frederick University , is the oldest and largest university in Norway, situated in the Norwegian capital of Oslo. The university was founded in 1811 and was modelled after the recently established University of Berlin...

    , Norway, for trying to understand why, in everyday life, people sigh.
  • Physics: Philippe Perrin, Cyril Perrot, Dominique Deviterne, Bruno Ragaru and Herman Kingma for trying to determine why discus throwers
    Discus throw
    The discus throw is an event in track and field athletics competition, in which an athlete throws a heavy disc—called a discus—in an attempt to mark a farther distance than his or her competitors. It is an ancient sport, as evidenced by the 5th century BC Myron statue, Discobolus...

     become dizzy, and why hammer throwers
    Hammer throw
    The modern or Olympic hammer throw is an athletic throwing event where the object is to throw a heavy metal ball attached to a wire and handle. The name "hammer throw" is derived from older competitions where an actual sledge hammer was thrown...

     don't, in their paper "Dizziness in discus throwers is related to motion sickness generated while spinning".
  • Physiology: Anna Wilkinson, Natalie Sebanz, Isabella Mandl and Ludwig Huber for their study "No evidence of contagious yawning in the red-footed tortoise
    Red-footed tortoise
    The red-footed tortoise is a tortoise native to South America. It has also been introduced to many islands in the Caribbean. It draws its name from the red or orange scales visible on its limbs, as well as its head and tail...

     Geochelone carbonaria".
  • Public safety: John Senders of the University of Toronto
    University of Toronto
    The University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...

    , Canada, for conducting a series of safety experiments in which a person drives an automobile on a major highway while a visor repeatedly flaps down over his face, blinding him.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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