Improbable Research

Jatila van der Veen - Davis has joined the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists. She says:

I am a geophysicst by my first graduate degree; have taught physics and astronomy at high school and college for 14 years, and am now getting a PhD in Physics Education at the University of California, Santa Barbara. I also perform Middle Eastern and Balkan dance.

Jatila van der Veen - Davis
PhD Candidate, physics education
Gevirtz Graduate School of Education
University of California, Santa Barbara, USA

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Kevin W. Plaxco and Lisa M. Plaxco have joined the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists. Jing Xu, who nominated them, says:

I would like to nominate my thesis adviser, Kevin W. Plaxco, and his wife, Lisa M. Plaxco. Both hold degrees from Caltech (Kevin with PhD. in Biology, and Lisa with B.S. in Chemistry). They are a joint force conquering the filed of bioengineering (Kevin as a tenured chemistry and Biochemistry Professor at UCSB) and finance (Lisa as the associate director and portfolio strategist at First Quadrant in Pasadena, CA).

Kevin W. Plaxco
Professor of Biochemistry
University of California, Santa Barbara, USA

Lisa M. Plaxco
Chemist and portfolio strategist
First Quadrant, Pasadena, California, USA
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Vicente Martinez has joined the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists. He says:

I am a neuroscientist at the University of Michigan. I feel compelled to nominate myself for membership. I easily possess the most luxuriant hair in the Big Ten Conference, and I am an ass-poor doctoral candidate who can’t afford a hair cut. I attribute my luxuriant hair to my Latino ancestry.

Vicente Martinez
Ph.D. Candidate
Department of Psychology
Biopsychology and Behavioral Neuroscience
University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA

(Click on the photo to see more detail.)

Lisa-ann Gershwin has joined the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists. She says:

I am a jellyfish doctor. My hair travels around the world and discovers new species — kind of a mystic medusa as it were.

Dr. Lisa-ann Gershwin
National Marine Stinger Advisor
State Marine Stinger Advisor
Marine Stinger Coordinator
Surf Life Saving
S. Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

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Crispness is associated with crunchiness, but your ears make a difference. That’s the takeaway-and-chew-on-it message of an Oxford University study called The Role of Auditory Cues in Modulating the Perceived Crispness and Staleness of Potato Chips.

The authors, the experimental psychologists Massimiliano Zampini and Charles Spence, wax distinctly poetical:

“We investigated whether the perception of the crispness and staleness of potato chips can be affected by modifying the sounds produced during the biting action….

So begins this week’s Improbable Research column in The Guardian.