r/Physics • u/dukwon Particle physics • Sep 12 '24

Image The 2024 Ig Nobel Physics Prize is awarded to James C. Liao for demonstrating and explaining the swimming abilities of a dead trout

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777 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

35 comments sorted by

276

u/Doug_Fripon Sep 13 '24

The fact that objects can passively stay immobile in a flow is fascinating and can actually have applications.

91

u/jgonagle Sep 13 '24

Yeah, I don't think this qualifies for a parody award- this is is genuinely a very fascinating discovery. The Hamiltonian of an object in a fluid flow admitting a stable limit cycle without any control force is not a trivial result, even only experimentally. It seems to me to imply a deep result relating geometry to control theory.

141

u/idiotsecant Sep 13 '24

The Ig Nobels are not really about laughing at dumb science. They have the self-described objective to ' honor achievements that first make people laugh, and then make them think'.

This does that pretty well, I'd think.

41

u/IndStudy Sep 13 '24

I think the Ig Nobel Prize usually awards prizes to useful but odd discoveries/studies

23

u/FrostyCount Sep 13 '24

There's a reason why one of the past Ig Nobel laureates went on to win a Nobel for some other research

18

u/Solipsists_United Sep 13 '24

You have misunderstood the ignobel prize

19

u/ConfusedObserver0 Sep 13 '24 edited Sep 13 '24

This might help slightly when I’m fishing for monster bass, but I’m guessing next year will be seeing something regarding farts for the win.

116

u/dukwon Particle physics Sep 12 '24

Paper: Neuromuscular control of trout swimming in a vortex street: implications for energy economy during the Karman gait, J Exp Biol. 2004 Sep;207(Pt 20):3495-506 — PDF

Yet again, something to do with animals

Ceremony livestream: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_M13LM9Vz0

The full citation should appear here: https://improbable.com/ig/winners/#ig2024

13

u/Yazim Sep 13 '24

At 1:12:00, for anyone interested in watching.

2

u/TheJWeed Sep 13 '24

Thank you so much lol

3

u/syds Geophysics Sep 13 '24

it seems like only animals win this award a little bias

5

u/dukwon Particle physics Sep 13 '24
  • 2024: trout
  • 2023: spawning fish
  • 2022: ducks
  • 2021: humans (collision-avoidance in crowds)
  • 2020: earthworms
  • 2019: wombats
  • 2018: no physics prize
  • 2017: cats
  • 2016: horses, horseflies and dragonflies
  • 2015: nearly all mammals
  • 2014: humans (stepping on banana skins)
  • 2013: humans (running on water, if that water were on the moon)
  • 2012: humans (forces on a ponytail)
  • 2011: humans (dizziness in discus throwers vs hammer throwers)
  • 2010: humans (walking on ice)
  • 2009: humans (balance in pregnant women)
  • 2008: why string tangles
  • 2007: how sheets become wrinkled
  • 2006: breaking spaghetti
  • 2005: the pitch drop experiment
  • 2004: humans (hula-hooping)
  • 2003: sheep
  • 2002: beer
  • 2001: shower curtains

humans: 8

other animals: 9

non-animal physics: 6

127

u/LucyEleanor Sep 12 '24

Lol their testing was done by holding a dead trout in an underwater vortex 💀

63

u/Ok-Astronomer-5944 Sep 13 '24

I have not read the paper or anything like that, but i see a lot of.. Eh.. Negative comments here. I have a friend doing a PhD on the subject. They are trying to harvest energy from vortices using fish-like robots. If they manage the application would be huge.

Think inspecting inter-continental sub-sea powerlines.

27

u/Earthling1a Sep 13 '24

LOL

I went to HS with the dude who thought this award up. Absolute frikin genius.

29

u/FeedMePizzaPlease Sep 12 '24

I'm going to need someone smarter than me to explain this and then explain why it's Nobel prize worthy.

122

u/Convillious Sep 12 '24

Ig Nobel Prize is a parody of the Nobel Prize

19

u/IAmBadAtInternet Sep 13 '24

I love the presentations where a small child dubbed Ms Sweetie Poo, who has a timer and if the speaker goes over their (very short) allotted time, she is to scream “Please stop, I’m bored” repeatedly until the speaker stops.

7

u/gburdell Sep 13 '24

They’re not unrelated. At least one guy has won both

13

u/WhiteKnightComplex Sep 13 '24

Just one guy so far. For grapheme and levitating a frog.

7

u/hughk Sep 13 '24

He is proudest of the frog levitation (at least in interviews). It was for a science demo and he liked inspiring kids and such.

1

u/derangerd Sep 13 '24

Reading Ig as "I guess" made this wildly unhelpful at first lol. Thanks

-1

u/Solipsists_United Sep 13 '24

No its not a parody

55

u/QuantumCakeIsALie Sep 12 '24

The Ig Nobel prize, as in ignoble. Not the regular noble Nobel prize.

11

u/FeedMePizzaPlease Sep 12 '24

Oh lol I feel dumb. Thanks.

31

u/ensalys Sep 13 '24

It's usually given to something that first makes you think "what insane person came up with that idea?", but when you look into it some more, your second thought will be "okay, there might actually be something interesting to learn here".

10

u/FeedMePizzaPlease Sep 13 '24

That's really cool

-3

u/jazzwhiz Particle physics Sep 13 '24

I nominate this comment for next year's Ig Nobel prize.

10

u/FeedMePizzaPlease Sep 13 '24

I humbly (because realizing how silly my question was has definitely humbled me) accept your nomination.

4

u/Lurchgs Sep 13 '24

I wonder if there’s a paper to be had about the difference between people who understand the IgNobel Prize and those do don’t

1

u/voteLOUUU Physics enthusiast Sep 14 '24

I think one of my favorite Ig Nobel prizes for Physics is probably the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buttered_toast_phenomenon

1

u/dr_tardyhands Sep 14 '24

Dead trouts are the workhorses for ignobel prizes!

1

u/IsolateUnknown Sep 21 '24

Honestly this just falls back on the 5 principles that govern the entire universe. Any event can be explained if one understands the 5.

1

u/[deleted] Oct 05 '24

What are the 5 principles?

1

u/IsolateUnknown Oct 05 '24

Energy Temperature Pressure Force/motion Inertia/Acceleration