Achievements so surprising that they ‘make people laugh, then think’ are honored with an Ig Nobel Prize. Marc Abrahams, founder and organiser of this coveted award, will be a guest at NEMO Science Museum on Tuesday evening, 15 April, with a programme (in English) filled with science and humour. He will elaborate on the more than 30-year history of the award, present some of his all-time favourites and explain how you can win an ‘Ig’ (or not).

As part of the programme, recent Ig Nobel recipients – including the two UvA teams that won last year – will talk about and demonstrate the research that brought home the prizes:

• Daniel Bonn, Antoine Deblais, Tess Heeremans en Sander Woutersen (Ig Nobel Chemistry Prize 2024) will present their work on using chromatography to separate drunk and sober worms.
• Eric-Jan Wagenmakers and František Bartoš (Ig Nobel Probability Prize 2024), will present the work where they showed, both in theory and by 350,757 experiments, that when you flip a coin, it tends to land on the same side as it started.
• Mariska Kret and Eliska Prochazkova (Ig Nobel Applied Cardiology Prize 2022) will present their work where they sought and found evidence that when new romantic partners meet for the first time, and feel attracted to each other, their heart rates synchronise.
• Nienke Vulink (Ig Nobel Medicine Prize 2020) will present her work where she diagnosed a long-unrecognised medical condition: misophonia, the distress at hearing other people make chewing sounds.

During the night, artist Keira Lee Rice will make live drawings to illustrate each talk.

The programme (English spoken) will take place at NEMO Science Museum in Amsterdam, on Tuesday, 15 April 2025, from 20:00-21:30. Tickets cost €10 and can be ordered via the NEMO website through the link below.