I’m going to dress up as a flamenco dancer…

So yes, another year and I haven’t been nominated yet. My career is not in the right path. So, with nothing to show to the world from my own, I will comment this year’s Ig Nobel prizes.

PHYSICS PRIZE [JAPAN]: Kiyoshi Mabuchi, Kensei Tanaka, Daichi Uchijima and Rina Sakai, for measuring the amount of friction between a shoe and a banana skin, and between a banana skin and the floor, when a person steps on a banana skin that's on the floor. 

So yes, lots of laughs experimenting. They will probably be shown in You've Been Framed!.

NEUROSCIENCE PRIZE [CHINA, CANADA]: Jiangang Liu, Jun Li, Lu Feng, Ling Li, Jie Tian, and Kang Lee, for trying to understand what happens in the brains of people who see the face of Jesus in a piece of toast.

Perhaps they could write a joint proposal with Ig Nobel laureate Robert Matthews to see if the toast will fall with the face of Jesus down or up. What about adding a cat to the whole study? Will see… 

PSYCHOLOGY PRIZE [AUSTRALIA, UK, USA]: Peter K. Jonason, Amy Jones, and Minna Lyons, for amassing evidence that people who habitually stay up late are, on average, more self-admiring, more manipulative, and more psychopathic than people who habitually arise early in the morning.

Of course, I go to bed very early… the problem is that I also get up late… does it mean that I’m lazy? I will think about it and perhaps write a paper on that. As long as is short and I don‘t have to work much on it…

PUBLIC HEALTH PRIZE [CZECH REPUBLIC, JAPAN, USA, INDIA]: Jaroslav Flegr, Jan Havlíček and Jitka Hanušova-Lindova, and to David Hanauer, Naren Ramakrishnan, Lisa Seyfried, for investigating whether it is mentally hazardous for a human being to own a cat.

I was bitten by a cat once… and I can tell you that yes, it’s mentally draining. It was a very long day, with very unlikely and (now that I think about it) funny events. In one of them, I was so unlucky that in the hospital they gave me the phone number of the tomb engraver by accident. I was completely shocked. I still have nightmares about it. And no, I didn’t do anything to the cat. I actually saved its life… ok, let’s go for the next one. I don’t like this one…

BIOLOGY PRIZE [CZECH REPUBLIC, GERMANY, ZAMBIA]: Vlastimil Hart, Petra Nováková, Erich Pascal Malkemper, Sabine Begall, Vladimír Hanzal, Miloš Ježek, Tomáš Kušta, Veronika Němcová, Jana Adámková, Kateřina Benediktová, Jaroslav Červený and Hynek Burda, for carefully documenting that when dogs defecate and urinate, they prefer to align their body axis with Earth's north-south geomagnetic field lines.

I don’t know… what happens if they have a high voltage electricity line very close? Or if they have a computer nearby? Do they align with the resultant magnetic field? In any case, you can always substitute your compass for a dog when you go to the jungle. They also can help you hunting…

ART PRIZE [ITALY]: Marina de Tommaso, Michele Sardaro, and Paolo Livrea, for measuring the relative pain people suffer while looking at an ugly painting, rather than a pretty painting, while being shot [in the hand] by a powerful laser beam.

I even sometimes experiment pain looking at some paintings… and I don’t need any laser beam…

ECONOMICS PRIZE [ITALY]: ISTAT — the Italian government's National Institute of Statistics, for proudly taking the lead in fulfilling the European Union mandate for each country to increase the official size of its national economy by including revenues from prostitution, illegal drug sales, smuggling, and all other unlawful financial transactions between willing participants.

Because of course all the illegal money should be taxed… and use it for fighting prostitution, drugs, smuggling, and all unlawful behaviour…

MEDICINE PRIZE [USA, INDIA]: Ian Humphreys, Sonal Saraiya, Walter Belenky and James Dworkin, for treating "uncontrollable" nosebleeds, using the method of nasal-packing-with-strips-of-cured-pork.

You could use also tampons… I saw it in a movie…

ARCTIC SCIENCE PRIZE [NORWAY, GERMANY]: Eigil Reimers and Sindre Eftestøl, for testing how reindeer react to seeing humans who are disguised as polar bears.

I would dress up as a flamenco dancer… I don’t know… perhaps they would like to go to the feria :)

NUTRITION PRIZE [SPAIN]: Raquel Rubio, Anna Jofré, Belén Martín, Teresa Aymerich, and Margarita Garriga, for their study titled "Characterization of Lactic Acid Bacteria Isolated from Infant Faeces as Potential Probiotic Starter Cultures for Fermented Sausages."

You know, we are a food oriented culture. With this one and the study about the science of tapped beer I’m very proud of my country!

Music in the DNA

I have read this article and I found it very interesting. It summarizes the different ways in which our DNA can be translated into music. Read it if you are interested in the topic. One of the ways to create music is translating the 22 amino acids that can be obtained from our DNA bases into microtones. 

One of the composers that use DNA is Stuart Mitchell. Check this composition. It is absolutely beautiful:

Brain to brain interface

The future is almost here. I have read in Science Daily that researchers at the University of Washington have developed an interface that directly communicates two brains. In particular, one of the subjects controlled the movement of the right hand of the other person through internet. 

Of course, the technology is in its infancy, and both subjects have to be willing to do the experiment. One cannot control other person's motions without the previous consent of the other. It is far away yet but, wouldn't it be interesting to share one's experiences with others just by connecting your brains? I think people would be more understanding about other's people's feelings. 

You can check the whole article here.

Optimization methods based on nature

Today I will write about optimization methods based on biological concepts. But first I will introduce the concept of optimization, and why it is so important in science.

Science is based upon experiments and theories that explain the data obtained in those experiments. Those data are the observations we have of a particular phenomenon. They are measures of some physical quantity we can extract from the experiment. In general we try to correlate some physical quantities with others in the way of an equation, or physical law. These equations are composed by the observations and some parameters. For example, think about a straight line. The equation (physical law) would be: y=ax+b. That means that we have a series of measures of x and y, and we want to calculate the optimum parameters a and b that define that line.

It is important to note that we assume a physical law for the relationship between x and y. That is, our physical law would say that they are linearly correlated. The a and b parameters will describe other quantities related to the studied phenomenon. If our physical law is a straight line (more generally, if we have a linear problem), we have a procedure that calculates the parameters that define our data: the linear least squares fit. However, in Physics, and particularly in Geophysics, the equations are nonlinear. This poses a problem, because we usually want to find the models (parameters) that minimize the error between data and the equation (that is, linear least squares in linear fitting).

If the number of possible solutions is high (as usual in real problems), we cannot perform a systematic search. We need some algorithm that searches only in a small portion of the parameters' space. There exists a number of algorithms that can do that. Here we will talk about some of the ones that are based on biological concepts. As examples, I will explain Genetic Algorithms, Ant colonies, and Particle Swarm.

Genetic Algorithms are based on the idea that a solution (a set of parameters) is represented by a chromosome (each gene representing each parameter), and that a population evolves to the optimum (the best fit) following Darwinian rules. The operators that make the population evolve are the selection of the parents to be crossed, the crossover of the two solutions, mutation, and replacement of the individuals in the population. Each solution (chromosome) has a value that represents how well fitted the data are to said solution, and the individuals with better solutions have more opportunities to mate and therefore to pass on their information from generation to generation.

Another example of fitting algorithm is the Ant Colony Algorithm. In it, each agent (ant) creates a path that represents the solution. At first each ant will be wandering randomly, like in the natural world. Each trail will be marked with a pheromone trail. This makes the path attractive to other ants. If more ants follow this trail, it will be marked as well fitted. However, the pheromone trial evaporates with time. In that way, we will not end up always in the paths chosen by the first ants. The trail with higher pheromone content will be the solution.

Finally, we will explain the Particle Swarm Algorithm. In it, each solution is wandering through the parameters' space with certain velocity. This algorithm mimics the way a flock or a swarm behaves in the real world. In each iteration, each individual adjusts its movement along the parameters' space in function of the solution that is the leader in that iteration. The leader is, of course, the best fitted of all. The swarm as a whole changes its movement in function of the best solution found previously. Of course, there is a random component (in velocity) that prevents the search to end up in a local minimum.

It is very interesting to see how Biology can help in a purely mathematical problem like the optimization of functions. Of course, there are more Biology-based algorithms out there. I only mentioned the ones I know better. See Swarm Intelligence for other methods.