[mini-AIR] mini-AIR: Grit, grit, grit. (Also: Ig Nobel tickets go on sale next week.)

Wed Jun 29 12:32:51 EDT 2016

mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR")
June 2016, issue number 2016-06. ISSN 1076-500X.
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	Research that makes people LAUGH, then THINK.
	A tiny supplement to the magazine Annals of Improbable Research.
	Archive at <http://improbable.com/airchives/miniair>
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01 TABLE OF CONTENTS

02 Imminent Events
03 The Magazine Itself: Time & Boredom
04 SPOTLIGHT: The Influence of Grit
05 Ig Nobel Tickets Go On Sale July 7
06 Miscellaneous Poultry Grit Limerick Contest
07 Stuff From a Thief Ant Poet
08 MORE IMPROBABLE: Mummy Powder Munching, Navel Positioning
09 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Much Ado About Grit?
10 Improbable Research Events
11 — The Magazine (AIR) — How to Subscribe; How to Get Back Issues (*)
12 — Our Address (*)
13 — Please Forward/Post This Issue! (*)
14 — How to start or stop receiving mini-AIR (*)

	Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue.

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02 Imminent Events

IG NOBEL TICKETS GO ON SALE	— July 7, 2016
  Ig events in Iceland and the UK		— late July

DETAILS at
<http://improbable.com/improbable-research-shows/complete-schedule>

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03 The Magazine Itself: Time & Boredom

The special TIME & BOREDOM issue of the magazine is out — full of time, full also of timely boredom.

If you're a subscriber, you should have received email notifying how to download your copy of the issue. 

	SUBSCRIPTIONS & SINGLE ISSUES: <https://gumroad.com/improbable>

	Tables of Contents: <http://www.improbable.com/magazine/>

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04 SPOTLIGHT: The Influence of Grit

This month's research spotlight illuminates grit:

"Initiation of solid explosives by impact and friction: the influence of grit," F.P. Bowden and O.A. Gurton, Proceedings of the Royal Society of London A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, vol. 198, no. 1054, 1949, pp. 337-349. <https://is.gd/vWzAr8> The authors report:

"It is shown that the melting-point of the grit is the determining factor."

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05 Ig Nobel Tickets Go On Sale July 7

Tickets for the 26th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize ceremony will go on sale on Thursday, July 7, 2016, at noon (US eastern time):
<https://www.boxoffice.harvard.edu>

The ceremony itself will happen on Thursday, September 22.
DETAILS: <http://www.improbable.com/ig/2016/>

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06 Miscellaneous Poultry Grit Limerick Contest

This month's challenge: Devise a limerick elucidating this study:

"Miscellaneous studies on poultry grit," Roy Harrison Waite, Miscellaneous Studies on Poultry Grit, 1935, pp. 313-335. <https://is.gd/L6DB1a> The authors report:

"Chicks raised without grit made better than normal growth and insoluble grit appeared to be the most desirable.... In tests of hardness with a 'mechanical gizzard' a pebble grit ranked first."

Submit your perfectly formed, delightfully enlightening limerick to:

	POULTRY GRIT LIMERICK COMPETITION
	c/o <MARC aaattt IMPROBABLE dddooottt COM>

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07 Stuff From a Thief Ant Poet

The judges have chosen a winner in last month's Stuff From a Thief Ant Limerick Competition, which asked for a limerick to honor this study:

"(5Z, 8E)-3-Heptyl-5-Methylpyrrolizidine From a Thief Ant," Tappey H. Jones, Murray S. Blum, Henry M. Fales, and Catherine R. Thompson, The Journal of Organic Chemistry, vol. 45, no. 23, 1980, pp. 4778-4780.
<https://is.gd/Ttbau0>

The winner is INVESTIGATOR FREDERICK BETHKE, who wrote:

Griped the thief ant from his prison cell,
It's Tappey et al you should quell.
  They stole all my heptyl,
  A sin more than reptile,
And left me bereft of my smell.

Here's the outpouring by our LIMERICK LAUREATE, MARTIN EIGER:

From the forest, the ants are collected,
Placed in solvents, thereafter inspected.
  Within this motif,
  It's the ant who's the thief,
As their exudate's calmly dissected.

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08 MORE IMPROBABLE: Mummy Powder Munching, Navel Positioning

Recent improbable research bits you may have missed...

The podcast:

	LISTEN / DOWNLOAD: <http://goo.gl/sxh7DX>

	#66 Contagious Yawning in the Red-Footed Tortoise?
	#67 The Attempt to Automatically Recognize Boredom
	#68 Drunk German Speech
	#69 Eat Powdered Mummies for Good Health
	#70 Leaping Fish Injuries, and the Trauma Center

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

<> The most attractive navel position – where is it exactly?
<> A song for the peoples of Britain, in their hour of dismay.
<> Belgian sporting earthquake measurements project.
<> Applause-banning Ig Nobel Winner Lukashenko and his publicly naked citizens.
	...and lots more

Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists, etc (LFHCfS) <http://www.improbable.com/category/lfhcfs-hair-club/>:

More, at 
	[twitter]	@ImprobResearch, @MarcAbrahams, #IgNobel
	[facebook]	<http://www.facebook.com/improbableresearch>

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09 MAY WE RECOMMEND: Much Ado About Grit?

"Much Ado about Grit: A Meta-Analytic Synthesis of the Grit Literature," Marcus Credé, Michael C. Tynan, and  Peter D. Harms, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, epub May 2016. <https://is.gd/r7CpU1> The authors, at Iowa State University and the University of Alabama, explain:

"our results suggest that interventions designed to enhance grit may only have weak effects on performance and success, that the construct validity of grit is in question, and that the primary utility of the grit construct may lie in the perseverance facet."

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10 Improbable Research Events

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

IG NOBEL TICKETS GO ON SALE	— Jul 7, 2016
Reykjavik, Iceland			— Jul 2016
Blue Dot Festival, UK		— Jul 23, 2016
ESOF, Manchester, UK		— Jul 25, 2016
Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony	— Sep 22, 2016
Ig Informal Lectures		— Sep 24, 2016

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11 — The Magazine (AIR) — How to Subscribe; How to Get Back Issues (*)

The Annals of Improbable Research is a 6-issues-per-year magazine, published in PDF form. It's packed with research that makes people laugh, then think. (mini-AIR, the thing you are reading at this moment, is but a tiny, free-floating appendix to AIR.)

	<http://www.improbable.com/magazine/>
	SUBSCRIPTIONS	(just $25) 
	BACK-ISSUES 	(just $5 each)

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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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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 2016, Annals of Improbable Research

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14 — How to start or stop receiving mini-AIR (*)

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