Dr. Bodnar demonstrates mask/bra on Nobel winner Wolfgang Ketterle

Designers of a bra that turns into gas masks and a team who found that named cows produce more milk were among the winners of the 2009 Ig Nobel prizes.

The aim of the awards is to honour achievements that “first make people laugh and then make them think”.

The peace prize went to a Swiss research team who determined whether it is better to be hit over the head with a full or empty bottle of beer.

The Ig Nobel Prizes were presented to the winners by genuine Nobel laureates.

Dr Elena Bodnar won the public health prize for the bra that, in an emergency, can be converted into two gas masks.

She demonstrated her invention and gave one to each of the Nobel laureates as a gift.

Past winners also returned to take part in the celebrations. They included Kees Moeliker, the discoverer of homosexual necrophilia in the mallard duck, and Dr Francis Fesmire, who devised the digital rectal massage as cure for intractable hiccups.

RTFA. My personal fave – because it involves computational analysis – the award to three American researchers for determining why pregnant women do not tip over.




  1. Tim says:

    My fave is the mathematics prize going to the governor of Zimbabwe’s Reserve Bank. I guess for figuring out how to get 15 digits on their currency.

    Wasn’t there a time when these awards actually meant something?

  2. Ah_Yea says:

    I can only dream of becoming a winner someday…

  3. Olo Baggins of Bywater says:

    Hey guys, remember the Vail bear problem? Here’s an update:

    http://wesh.com/news/21170915/detail.html

  4. Thinker says:

    The Ig Nobels are always fun. Nice to see the scientists can laugh at themselves and have fun. 🙂

  5. Ah_Yea says:

    Baggins, thanks for the update.

    Very funny, and I am left thinking “That’s one very lucky lady!”

  6. Dallas says:

    My submission of the jock strap mask came in second place.

  7. proberge says:

    Depending on the bra size, the mask can either swallow your head or let you breath gas.

  8. Benjamin says:

    I want to get a Zimbabwean 100 trillion dollar bill. On Wikipedia it shows the that when first issued it would buy three eggs. Where I live you can buy a whole dozen for 59 cents(US).

  9. Ah_Yea says:

    It may not be 100 trillion, but I’ll still take one of these.

    http://tinyurl.com/mu4gj6

  10. The Monster's Lawyer says:

    Is that my old school chum “El Boner” Elena Bodnar? She hasn’t changed a lick.

  11. jP8 says:

    He created that to protect him self from the smell of carbon dioxide exhaled out of the lungs of global warming/change alarmists that were there (namely Gore) while enjoying the smell of beautiful babes breasts.

  12. meetsy says:

    Next year they’ll go for MY invention…a used thong gas mask!

  13. Angel H. Wong says:

    #12 Meetsy,

    Don’t forget the elephant thong that doubles as a water bottle.

  14. brm says:

    I’m usually sticking my face into the fronts of these things.


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