[mini-AIR] mini-AIR: Frozen toes, fissures, whatnot

Fri Oct 23 08:23:14 EDT 2015

mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR")
Octtember 2015, issue number 2015-10. ISSN 1076-500X.
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The monthly wee little tiny mini update/alert from Improbable Research
	Archive at <http://improbable.com/airchives/miniair>
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2015-10-01 TABLE OF CONTENTS

2015-10-02 Imminent Events
2015-10-02 In the Magazine: Clever Inventions
2015-10-04 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: S.S.S. in S.S.S.
2015-10-05 New Hair Club for Science Journalists
2015-10-06 Frozen Toe of Glacier Snout Limerick Contest
2015-10-07 Boiling Green Cheese Poet
2015-10-08 MORE IMPROBABLE: Ig Winners in Prison, Hair, Coffee, OM...
2015-10-09 MAY WE RECOMMEND: 'Frozen Finger' for Fissures
2015-10-10 Improbable Research Events
2015-10-11 — How to Get the Magazine (*)
2015-10-12 — Our Address (*)
2015-10-13 — Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)
2015-10-14 — How to start or stop receiving this newsletter (*)

	Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue.

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2015-10-02 Imminent Events

	Annual "Science Friday" day-after-Thanksgiving
	Ig Nobel special radio broadcast 				— Nov 27, 2015

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2015-10-02 In the Magazine: Clever Inventions, and PDFs

The special CLEVER INVENTIONS issue of the magazine (vol. 21, no. 5) will burst forth a few days from now. And this year's special Ig Nobel issue (21:6) is nipping at its heels.

REMINDER: 
All issues of the magazine henceforth will be published in PDF form. (21:5 and 21:6 will be the last issues we publish also on paper.)

	INTRODUCTORY NEW PDF SUBSCRIPTION price:   — $15/year —

	[Special price available, worldwide, only UNTIL OCTOBER 31, 2015]
	[Starting November 1, 2015, new subscriptions will be $25/year.]

	SUBSCRIPTIONS and BACK ISSUES:
	<http://www.improbable.com/magazine/>

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2015-10-04 RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: S.S.S. in S.S.S.

This month's spotlight shines on sortable silt cycles on certain slopes:

"Sortable Silt Cycles in Svalbard Slope Sediments 74–0 ka," Simon P. Jessen andTine L. Rasmussen, Journal of Quaternary Science, epub October 4, 2015. <http://goo.gl/pe4FWv>  (Thanks to Tom Gill for bringing this to our attention.) The authors, at the  Arctic University of Norway, report:

"The grain size of sortable silt (SS, 10–63 μm) was studied in sediment core JM04-025PC from a sediment drift on the lower part of the western Svalbard slope."

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2015-10-05 New Hair Club for Science Journalists

The Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club (LFHCfs) is proud to announce the founding of yet another sibling club, The Luxuriant Flowing, Former, or Facial Hair Club for Science Journalists (LFFFHCfSJ).

The LFFFHCfSJ was founded in October 2015, at the suggestion of Dutch science journalist Ellen de Bruin, who became the new club's first member. The new club's first three members on display at <http://goo.gl/kxeMmx> and <http://goo.gl/dvNsKm>, and <http://goo.gl/VSlTrj>.

The LFFFHCfSJ joins the original club's other siblings: the Luxuriant Former Hair Club for Scientists (LFHCfs); the Luxuriant Facial Hair Club for Scientists (LFHCfs); and the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Social Scientists(LFFFHCfSS).

Hair clubs history: <http://www.improbable.com/hair/>
Hair clubs individual member displays: <http://goo.gl/q0BrFj>

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2015-10-06 Frozen Toe of Glacier Snout Limerick Contest

Glacier toes inspire this month's limerick competition. To enter, compose an original limerick that clarifies the nature of this study:

"Frozen Toe (Outer Zone of Glacier Snout)," Pratima Pandey, Encyclopedia of Snow, Ice and Glaciers, Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series 2014, p 311. <http://goo.gl/hG9O3C> The author says:

"The frozen toe is a leading edge of a glacier formed due to the glaciotectonism or the thrust which takes place beneath a glacier. It is the frozen outer zone of the snout and has a shape of a boot (shoes) or toe."

Submit your perfectly formed limerick to:

	FROZEN TOE OF GLACIER SNOUT LIMERICK COMPETITION
	c/o <MARC aaattt IMPROBABLE dddooottt COM>

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2015-10-07 Boiling Green Cheese Poet

The judges have chosen a winner in last month's Boiling Green Cheese Component Limerick Competition, which asked for a limerick to honor this study:

"Studies Regarding the Effect of Temperature on the Quality of Green Cheese During a Constant Boiling Period," Leonte Mihai, Pircu Nicoleta, Aruş Vasilica Alisa, MOCM, Number 13, Volume 1, 2007. <http://goo.gl/zoT6H6> The authors, at the University of Bacău, report:

The winner is INVESTIGATOR TONY HARKER, who wrote:

The waste stuff from cheese is okay,
It’s full of nutrition we say:
  Cooked at eighty degrees
  It will give you green cheese –
Ah, where there’s a will there’s a whey.

Here's the offering from our LIMERICK LAUREATE, MARTIN EIGER:

One should not let one's whey go astray.
Use whey wisely, but how? In what way?
  Best results have been seen
  In cheese that is green,
And boiled the way these guys say.

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2015-10-08 MORE IMPROBABLE: Ig Winners in Prison, Hair, Coffee, OM...

Recent improbable bits you maybe missed.

The weekly podcast:

	LISTEN / DOWNLOAD: <http://goo.gl/sxh7DX>
		(It's also on Play.it, iTunes, and Spotify)

	#32 A report on reports on reports, coffee, and ponytails
	#33 Make sure colonoscopy patients will not explode
	#34 OM..., OM..., OM..., monkey wrench, basic black dress

New members of the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists (LFHCfS) and related clubs <http://goo.gl/q0BrFj>:

	· Steve Trim
	· Nastasia Okulova
	· Andrew Sayer
	· Melanie During
	· David Brooks
	· Lucas Brouwers
	· Ellen de Bruin
	· Valerio Molinari

The blog: <http://www.improbable.com/>:

	· 26 co-winners of the 2009 Ig Nobel economics prize have been sentenced to prison
	· The newspaper column: moving on…
	· Women who are captured by love, sort of
	· Prof. Dr. Dr. Dr. Hanns Hatt and the smell of a woman
	· The effect of music on the efficiency of surgical closures
	...and lots more

MORE MORE MORE, at 
	[blog]	<www.IMPROBABLE.com>
	[twitter]	@ImprobResearch, @MarcAbrahams, #IgNobel
	[facebook]	<http://www.facebook.com/improbableresearch>
	[podcast]	<http://goo.gl/GqUW6i>

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2015-10-09 MAY WE RECOMMEND: 'Frozen Finger' for Fissures

" ‘Frozen Finger’ in Anal Fissures," Megha Tandon and Rohan Khandelwal, Tropical Doctor, vol. 39, no. 4, 2009, pp. 225-226. <http://goo.gl/e4ZaDf> The authors, at Vardhman Mahavir Medical College, New Delhi, India, report:

"Acute anal fissures are usually managed by various invasive and non-invasive modalities ranging from simple lifestyle changes to chemical and surgical sphincterotomies. Frozen finger, prepared using a water-filled ordinary rubber glove, was successfully used in one hundred patients, thus providing a cost-effective and simple solution to the problem."

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2015-10-10 — Improbable Research Events

For details and additional events, see
<http://improbable.com/improbable-research-shows/complete-schedule>

"Science Friday" Ig Nobel radio	— Nov 27, 2015
U Rhode Island				— Dec 8, 2015
PINC, Sarasota, FL				— Dec 10, 2015
SIBC, Portland, OR				— Jan 5, 2016
AAAS, Washington, DC			— Feb TBA, 2016
Ig Nobel EuroTour				— Mar TBA, 2016
ESOF, Manchester, UK			— Jul TBA, 2016

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2015-10-11 — How to Get the Magazine (*)

The Annals of Improbable Research is a 6-issues-per-year magazine, in PDF form. It's chock full of research that makes people laugh, then think. (It's got muuuuuuch more stuff than the little bits you see this newsletter.)

	SUBSCRIPTIONS and BACK-ISSUES: 
	<http://www.improbable.com/magazine/>

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2015-10-12 — Our Address (*)

Annals of Improbable Research (AIR)
PO Box 380853, Cambridge, MA 02238 USA
(+1) 617-491-4437

EDITORIAL: <MARC aaattt IMPROBABLE dddooottt COM>
SUBSCRIPTIONS: <subscriptions AT improbable.com>
Web Site and blog: <http://www.improbable.com>
Twitter: @ImprobResearch

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2015-10-13 — Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)

Please distribute copies of mini-AIR (or excerpts!) wherever appropriate. The only limitations are: A) Please indicate that the material comes from mini-AIR. B) You may NOT distribute mini-AIR for commercial purposes.

	------------- mini-AIRheads -------------
EDITOR: Marc Abrahams
CO-CONSPIRATORS: Kees Moeliker, Alice Shirrell Kaswell, Gary Dryfoos, Ernest Ersatz, Stephen Drew
PROOFREADER: Ambient Happenstance
AUTHORITY FIGURES: Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach, Sheldon Glashow, Richard Roberts

Key words: improbable research, science humor, Ig Nobel, AIR, the
(c) copyright 2015, Annals of Improbable Research

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2015-10-14 — How to start or stop receiving this newsletter (*)

Mini-AIR is a (free!) teeny-tiny monthly *supplement* 
to the big, bold six-times-a-year magazine AIR.
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