A group of Japanese researchers discovered mammals like pigs and rats could breathe through their anuses|Tambako The Jaguar|CC BY-ND 2.0
The Ig Nobel Prize for funny and quirky scientific breakthroughs was handed out over the weekend at MIT. Among the winners was a group of Japanese researchers who discovered that mammals like pigs and rats could breathe through their anuses.
The awards have no connection to the original Nobel Prize, which will take place in October.
Unlike the $1 million awarded to Nobel Prize recipients, the IG Nobel winners received the obsolete Zimbabwean $10 trillion bill, which can be bought for $22 on eBay.
Funny but life-saving
Notably, finding out that mammals can breathe through their rears is life-saving, say the scientists. Their paper discusses how this could provide alternative ways of getting oxygen to critically ill patients when hospitals run low on ventilators and artificial lung supplies.
Other giggle-worthy and mind-boggling discoveries that won the Ig Nobel Awards include:
- Botany prize for evidence that real plants try to mimic the leaves of fake plants nearby.
- Physics prize for proving dead trout can swim.
- Chemistry prize for using chromatography to separate drunk and sober worms.
A probability prize discovery for finding out that a coin flip is not a 50-50 chance also got a prize.
A European team conducted 350,757 experiments to prove that a flipped coin mostly lands on the same side it started.