Ig Nobel Prize

The Ig Nobel Prize (pronounced IG NO-BELL, a pun on "ignoble", meaning "an achievement based on baseness, lowness, or meanness") is awarded annually to the ten scientific achievements that "first make people laugh, and then make them think." They are given in early October in a ceremony at Harvard University's Sanders Theater (originally at MIT). The first Ig Nobels were awarded in 1991.

The awards are presented by actual Nobel Prize winners. The ceremonies are known for the tossing of paper airplanes on the platform, which are dutifully swept away by the "Keeper of the Broom" (real-life physics professor Roy J. Glauber, who actually had to miss the 2005 awards as he was en route to Sweden to receive a real Nobel Prize in Physics for his work in optical coherence).

See also[edit]

• Nobel Prize

References[edit]

External links[edit]

• Ig Informal Lectures today Home of the Ig Nobel Prizes.