Improbable Research

Become one of life’s ultimate insiders! In PARASITES UNLEASHED! you control a wily parasite, racing to complete your life cycle, mate, and lay eggs before your opponents. Do all the entertainingly gross things real parasites do — bore into vital organs, hide inside a blood cell, hitch a ride inside a mosquito, even take over your host’s brain! But beware, because your enemies can add stages to your life cycle, and zap you with medicine!

PARASITES UNLEASHED! is a simple and fast-paced non-collectible card game for 2-4 players ages 8 and up.

So say the manufacturers. But this parasite-infested game, unlike the parasites that infest it, is still leashed. The manufacturers say they will be “shipping” it several months from now.
(Thanks to investigator Sally Shelton for bringing this to our attention.)

Investigator Kristina McCormack writes:

This may not meet the technical requirements for a formal Nomination to the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists, but I believe it merits further inquiry on behalf of that noble institution. Perhaps an honorary membership is in order, at least. From an article by Space.com:

Astronaut Cuts Her Hair in Space for Charity

They appear as two line items in a final transfer list between the space shuttle Discovery and the International Space Station: items 811 and 811.1. Uplinked to the shuttle crew as a final preparation for the undocking of Discovery from the station on Tuesday, the list identifies 811 as Sunita Williams, FE-2, and 811.1 as a ponytail….

“Remove ponytail from 811 prior to transfer of 811″ reads the resupply transfer list. “Report final stowage location.”

“We believe 811.1 has been completed, please confirm,” ground controllers wrote to the crew elsewhere in the list.

Williams, who arrived at the outpost last week with long flowing - and floating - hair, arranged to have her locks cut last Sunday and the clippings stowed on Discovery for a future hairpiece to be donated to a patient suffering from long-term medical hair loss.

Such sacrifice is a noble thing.

This study compares the mean and normalised distribution of the Body Mass Index of women and men in the Marvel Universe, and with women and men in the “real” world.

So reads the abstract of a study published online: “Comparative Sex-Specific Body Mass Index in the Marvel Universe and the “Real” World,” by Karen Healey and Terry D. Johnson.

(Thanks to investigator Michael Croft for bringing this to our attention.)

Horseshoe Fixation versus Hoof Colour, a Comparative Study, by five scientists at the University of Guelph, in Canada, digs deep into an old question. Some horses have white hooves, some have black, some have an assortment. Which colour holds horseshoes most reliably?

Professor RJ Runcimen and his colleagues write: “In an application that is as much art as science, it is not surprising that a certain amount of common mythology would develop. In the case of horseshoes, one commonly held belief is that black hooves hold their shoes more securely than white.”

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

Investigator Machiel Stolk writes:

The research of the famous Gert Holstege has reached another climax! Recently, a Dutch national newspaper [de Volkskrant] reported that Holstege has scientifically proved that “women lose control when they are having an orgasm”. Holstege used his favorite research instrument, the PET scan, to investigate women?s brain activity during an orgasm. He found out that during periods of sexual excitement, less blood circulates through the left frontal lobe in the brain. Less blood circulation means less brain activity, and as is commonly known, the left frontal lobe is responsible for keeping our temper and anger under control.

The importance of Holstege?s research is immediately demonstrated by a [December 13, 2006] report in the Times of London which describes the case of a 29 year old Christian newly-wed who filed a ?3.5 million compensation claim against his employers, saying that his marriage was ruined because his sex drive spiralled out of control after a head injury at work.