Scientific research that makes people laugh, then think finds its way into the annals of the Improbable Research, eventually competing for the Ig Nobel awards each year. Carmen Nobel visited this year and writes about it:
The requisite small-talk name-dropping bests that of most cocktail parties. Overheard conversation snippets at this year’s party include, “I don’t know if you remember him, but he studied penguin poo under pressure,” and “Oh, right, she played Star Wars movies to locusts.”