One of the side effects of venturing to high altitudes (or any environment where the air pressure is lower than normal, say, for example inside a passenger airplane at cruising height) is an increase in the expellation of intestinal gases. As a number of our readers will no doubt be aware, the syndrome was first […]
Tag: airplane
Of powered paper airplanes, and the great outdoors
Paper airplanes are a tradition at the annual Ig Nobel Prize ceremony, dating back to the ceremony’s earliest years. Technology has now advanced to the point where it necessary, for safety, to place a technological limitation on ceremonial flight. An inventive little tiny leap in electromechanical engineering has brought powered flight — that is powered […]
Simulated High-Altitude Taste Testing of Tomato Juice
The taste of tomato juice has been tested at high levels —or, rather, at simulated high levels. This study contains details about that: “Odor and taste perception at normal and low atmospheric pressure in a simulated aircraft cabin,” Andrea Burdack-Freitag, Dino Bullinger, Florian Mayer, Klaus Breuer, Journal für Verbraucherschutz und Lebensmittelsicherheit, March 2011, Volume 6, […]
The man who separates cookies
Artist David Neevel, labeling himself as a “physicist”, though he seems to mean “engineer”, presents this video of himself with a machine that separates the components of an Oreo cookie: Neevel is also noted for his use, on another project, of paper airplanes: (Thanks to investigator Sally Ramos for bringing this to our attention.)