This drawing by artist Becky Moon celebrates the 2013 Ig Nobel Archaeology Prize, which was awarded to
Brian Crandall and Peter Stahl, for parboiling a dead shrew, and then swallowing the shrew without chewing, and then carefully examining everything excreted during subsequent days — all so they could see which bones would dissolve inside the human digestive system, and which bones would not. [The documented that experiment, in the study “Human Digestive Effects on a Micromammalian Skeleton,” Journal of Archaeological Science, vol. 22, November 1995, pp. 789–97.
Crandall and Stahl’s swallow-a-shrew experiment will be honored in a song that’s part of the mini-opera (the opera is called “The Plight of the Gastroenterologist”) that will premiere as part of this year’s (2025) Ig Nobel Prize ceremony.
Coming: The 2025 Ig Nobel Prize Winners
The 2025 Ig Nobel Prizes will be awarded at the 35th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize ceremony, on Thursday evening, September 18, 2025. Ten new winners will be honored for doing things that make people LAUGH, then THINK. TICKETS to attend the ceremony are now on sale.
