Ariel Kraakman demonstrates the dynamics of hula-hooping, on the day after she first took up the practice. In so doing, she unknowingly honors the research of scientists Ramesh Balasubramaniam and Michael Turvey, who were awarded the Ig Nobel Prize in physics in 2004 for their study “Coordination Modes in the Multisegmental Dynamics of Hula Hooping” [Biological Cybernetics, vol. 90, no. 3, March 2004, pp. 176-90]. This is the new episode — #130, “The Dynamics of Hula Hooping” — of the Improbable Research TV series.
To see this episode, click on the image at right, and you will be whisked to YouTube (where you can subscribe, if you like, to the Improbable Research channel).
BONUS: News report about hula hooping in Tarrytown