Mini-AIR

mini-Annals of Improbable Research ("mini-AIR")

February 2024, issue number 2024-02. ISSN 1076-500X.

improbable.com/publications/newsletter-mini-air/

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Research that makes people LAUGH, then THINK.

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01 TABLE OF CONTENTS

02 IN THE MAGAZINE ITSELF: Riddles, Puzzles, Conundrums

03 Time on Two Decades of Testing

04 Video of the Face-to-Face Event

05 DENVER: The Return of the live Improbable Research Show at AAAS

06 EUROPE: The Return of the Ig Nobel EuroTour

07 LIMERICK CHALLENGE: Time on Time (and Space)

08 Plan of Day (and Weeks) Limerick Winner

09 MORE IMPROBABLE: Sewage & Cheese, Lund, Wild Alert

10 Time on Cement Log Interpretation

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20 SOME IMPROBABLE EVENTS

30 — Subscribe to the Actual Magazine! (*)

31 — How to start or stop receiving this little newsletter (*)

32 — Contact Info (*)

33 — Standard Gobbledegook (*)

Items marked (*) are reprinted in every issue.

What you are reading at the moment (mini-AIR) is overflow detritus

from the magazine Annals of Improbable Research (AIR).

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02 IN THE MAGAZINE ITSELF: Riddles, Puzzles, Conundrums

The special RIDDLES & PUZZLES issue (vol. 30, no. 1) of the magazine has been sent to subscribers. The table of contents and selected articles are at:

https://improbable.com/annals-of-improbable-research-january-february-2024-vol-30-number-1/

The next issue, a special ANTS issue, is in prep.

SUBSCRIBE to the MAGAZINE, or get BACK ISSUES (there are more than 150 of them!): gumroad.com/improbable

Tables of Contents: improbable.com/magazine-2/

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03 Time on Two Decades of Testing

This month's quasi-haphazardly selected research report of the month (QHSRROTM) is:

"Rain Resistance of Windows – Lessons Learned from Two Decades of Laboratory Testing," Lars Gullbrekken, Therese Gransjøen, Erlend Andenæs, Berit Time, and Tore Kvande, SINTEF academic publishing house 2022, Climate 2050 Note 162.

prod-aaudxp-cms-001-app.azurewebsites.net/media/x4tkc3uc/121_nsb2023_scientificpaper_cameraready.pdf

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04 Video of the Face-to-Face Event

Here's edited video of the recent Ig Nobel Face-to-Face event:

improbable.com/2024/02/07/video-of-the-very-first-ig-nobel-face-to-face-event/

This was a new companion event to the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony. Most of the new Ig Nobel Prize winners gathered together, to ask each other questions about their work. This happened at the new MIT Museum, in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

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05 DENVER: The Return of the live Improbable Research Show at AAAS

After being strictly virtual during the early pandemic years, the Improbable Research show at the AAAS (American Association for the Advancement of Science) Annual Meeting will return to being a live event — with people and whatnot all together in one big room.

It will feature necrobotics, fluid dynamics, miscellany, and bananas. Paper airplanes are welcome. Bring some paper.

WHEN: Saturday, February 17, 2024, 8 pm.

Open free to everyone, not just to meeting registrants.

WHERE: Crystal Ballroom, Third Floor, Embassy Suites by Hilton Denver Downtown Convention Center, DENVER, COLORADO

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06 EUROPE: The Return of the Ig Nobel EuroTour

The Ig Nobel EuroTour, which was entirely interrupted by the pandemic, is back.

Ig Nobel Prize winners galore will tell and show all (or at least much) about their prize-winning work. each has done something that makes people LAUGH, then THINK.

The schedule — which is still expanding — is at https://improbable.com/upcoming-events/

One highlight (a three-part highlight!) will be the Rome Science Festival, with events on April 19, 20, and 21. Each of those shows will feature different Ig Nobel Prize winners.

WHEN: April 2024

WHERE: DENMARK, SWITZERLAND, ITALY

(Additional events look likely in SPAIN, GERMANY, and the UK. We will keep you posted as events are added.)

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07 LIMERICK CHALLENGE: Time on Time (and Space)

This month's RESEARCH LIMERICK challenge — Devise a pleasing limerick that encapsulates this study:

"Analysis of Space and Time Structures in Two-Phase Flow Using Capacitance Sensors," R.W. Time, Thesis (Dr. Scient.), Hoegskolesenteret i Rogaland, Stavanger, Norway, 1993. osti.gov/etdeweb/biblio/10142754

Submit your perfectly formed, delightfully enlightening limerick to:

TIME ON TIME LIMERICK COMPETITION

c/o MARC aaattt IMPROBABLE dddooottt COM

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08 Plan of Day (and Weeks) Limerick Winner

The judges have chosen a winner in last month's Competition, which asked for a limerick to explain this pair of studies:

"The Plan of the Day: Managing the Dynamic Transition from Regional Conservation Designs to Local Conservation Actions," Robert L. Pressey, Morena Mills, Rebecca Weeks, and Jon C. Day, Biological Conservation, vol. 166, 2013, pp. 155-169. doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2013.06.025

Winning limerickicist DIANNE O'LEARY writes:

"Let's save all the trees!" — Nice to say.

"It can't be so hard anyway."

But miles of red tape

Force designs to reshape,

Requiring a new plan each day.

This month's take from our LIMERICK LAUREATE, MARTIN EIGER:

Ecological policy may

Need frequent adjustment, they say.

How often, I fear,

Isn't perfectly clear.

They imply maybe weeks or a day.

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09 MORE IMPROBABLE: Sewage & Cheese, Lund, Wild Alert

Recent improbable research bits you may have missed...

BLOG: www.improbable.com:

• The Sewage and Cheese Whey Adventure

• Prizes of Various Sorts in Lund

• La Jolla Alert: A Possible Profusion of Wild Anchovy Wild Sex

• …and much more

WEEKLY COLUMN IN NEW SCIENTIST MAGAZINE:

newscientist.com/author/marc-abrahams/

LUXURIANT FLOWING HAIR CLUB FOR SCIENTISTS (LFHCfS):

www.improbable.com/category/lfhcfs-hair-club/

PODCAST ARCHIVE:

www.improbable.com/category/the-weekly-improbable-research-podcast/

FACEBOOK: facebook.com/improbableresearch

MASTODON: @MarcAbrahams@mstdn.science

INSTAGRAM: instagram.com/improbable_research/

PATREON: patreon.com/ImprobableResearch

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10 Time on Cement Log Interpretation

This month's Other Haphazardly-Selected Research Report (OQHSRROTM) of the month is:

"Assisted Cement Log Interpretation Using Machine Learning," Erlend Magnus Viggen, Bjørn-Jostein Singstad, Eirik Time, Siddharth Mishra, and Eirik Berg, SPE Drilling & Completion, vol. 38, no. 2, 2023, pp. 220-234. doi.org/10.2118/209529-PA

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TREAT YOURSELF TO (MUCH) MORE IMPROBABLE STUFF.

SUBCRIBE TO THE (PDF) MAGAZINE!

improbable.com/magazine-2/

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20 SOME IMPROBABLE EVENTS

· Boskone, Boston, MA, USA — February 10, 2024

· AAAS Annual Meeting, Denver, CO, USA — Feb 17, 2014

· 2024 IG NOBEL EURO-TOUR:

· U Aarhus, Denmark — Apr 9, 2024

· Copenhagen, Denmark — Apr 10, 2024

· EPFL, Lausanne, Switzerland — Apr 16 2024

· Rome Science Festival, Italy — April 19, 20, 21, 2024

· Oxford, UK — date TBA

· Other EuroTour events TBA

· 34th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony — Sep 2024

· Balticon, Baltimore, USA — May 23-26, 2025

OTHER EVENTS TBA

[All live events are subject to pandemical constraints and adventures.]

For details and additional events, see: improbable.com/upcoming-events/

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30 — Subscribe to the Actual Magazine! (*)

The Annals of Improbable Research is a 6-issues-per-year magazine,

in PDF form. It's packed with research that makes people laugh, then think.

improbable.com/publications/magazine

SUBSCRIPTIONS ($25, for six issues)

BACK ISSUES ($5 each)

(mini-AIR, the thing you are reading at this moment, is but a tiny, free-floating appendix to the actual magazine.)

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31 — How to start or stop receiving this newsletter (*)

This newsletter, Mini-AIR, is just a (free!) tiny monthly *supplement* to the big, bold six-times-a-year magazine Annals of Improbable Research.

To SUBSCRIBE or UNSUBSCRIBE to mini-AIR, see the links at the end of this email.

ARCHIVES: improbable.com/publications/newsletter-mini-air/

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32 — CONTACT INFO (*)

Annals of Improbable Research (AIR)

improbable.com

EDITORIAL: MARC aaattt IMPROBABLE dddooottt COM

SUBSCRIPTION QUESTIONS: subscriptions AT improbable.com

Cambridge, MA, USA

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33 — Standard Gobbledegook (*)

EDITOR: Marc Abrahams

CO-CONSPIRATORS: Kees Moeliker, Alice Shirrell Kaswell, Gary Dryfoos, Nan Swift, Stephen Drew

PROOFREADER: Ambient Happenstance

AUTHORITY FIGURES: Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach, Sheldon Glashow, Richard Roberts

Key words: improbable research, science humor, Ig Nobel, AIR, the

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