Research on Milk from Cockroach Wins Ig Nobel Prize

Ten research teams were honored Sept. 3 at a satirical science awards ceremony that was hosted outside the U.S. for the first time due to travel concerns. Researchers who studied milk from cockroaches and analyzed soil health using underwear received Ig Nobel Prizes celebrating unusual and imaginative contributions to science.You may also like to read Australian Scientists Develop Cyborg Cockroaches for Medical Missions Japan's Farmers Go Nocturnal as Deadly Heat Intensifies Researcher Wins Ig Nobel Prize for Nose-Blowing At a convention center in Zurich, Switzerland, research teams received a custom trophy resembling a cross between a mushroom and a human foot. Among them were Matilda Brindle and Stuart West from the University of Oxford and the Florida Institute of Technology's Catherine F. Talbot, who reconstructed the evolutionary history of kissing. Another research team buried 1,000 pairs of underwear in more than 25 countries to study how critters in the soil helped them decompose. As per tradition, audience members fashioned paper airplanes and hurled them toward the stage to kick off the show. For future ceremonies, organizers plan to alternate between Zurich and other European countries. The 2027 ceremony will be held in the Belgian city of Antwerp. Previous iterations took place at Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Boston University, but there are no immediate plans to return to the U.S. 'During the past year, it has become unsafe for our guests to visit the country,' Marc Abrahams, master of ceremonies and editor of the magazine, told The Associated Press in an email in March.