(?:Ig)? Nobel Laureate

October 5, 2010 7:55 PM

Andre Geim has earned many awards from his peers for groundbreaking research in physics, but he's arguably only won the attention of the general public a couple times: First for levitating a frog, and then for discovering 2D atomic crystals. For these efforts he has become the first person to be a laureate of both the Ig Nobel Prize and Nobel Prize.
posted by ardgedee (12 comments total)

Congrats to him! That is an awesome place to be, I thin. One the one hand your research is just so far out that people think you are mad, on the other, you are earning the respect and admiration of others.
posted by strixus at 8:17 PM on October 5, 2010

He's the Sandra Bullock of science.
posted by 445supermag at 8:34 PM on October 5, 2010 [1 favorite]

Dude looks exactly like Chevy Chase.
posted by adamdschneider at 9:11 PM on October 5, 2010

Nice post title.
posted by kenko at 9:11 PM on October 5, 2010

From the APS link:

Geim has a knack for quirky yet significant research subjects. He made headlines in 1997 when he used a magnetic field to levitate a frog, garnering him an Ig Nobel Prize in 2000. He once co-authored a paper with his favorite hamster, “Detection of earth rotation with a diamagnetically levitating gyroscope,” insisting that “H. A. M. S. ter Tisha” contributed to the levitation experiment “most directly.” (According to Wikipedia the hamster later applied for a PhD at the University of Nijmegen.)

But did the hamster get the degree? Come on!
posted by kenko at 9:13 PM on October 5, 2010 [1 favorite]

Here's the paper kenko found:

Detection of earth rotation with a diamagnetically levitating gyroscope
A. K. Geim and H. A. M. S. ter Tisha
Physica B: Condensed Matter
Volumes 294-295, January 2001, Pages 736-739.
doi:10.1016/S0921-4526(00)00753-5
posted by needled at 9:19 PM on October 5, 2010 [2 favorites]

I lament this day, as the spotlight has moved from the venerable tube to the prosaic plate.
posted by Tube at 9:21 PM on October 5, 2010

The spotlight never leaves my venerable tube.
posted by kenko at 9:30 PM on October 5, 2010

The Nobel is well-deserved, that levitating frog is remarkable, but I don't get what's so funny about 2D crystals.
posted by Durhey at 10:27 PM on October 5, 2010

Dude got a Nobel Prize for playing with Scotch tape and a pencil. Damn.
posted by 7-7 at 12:47 AM on October 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

Dude figured out how magnets fucking work!
posted by 3.2.3 at 4:57 AM on October 6, 2010 [2 favorites]

Oh look, the Nobel Prize has updated their website. Now it's completely awful.
posted by maryr at 8:49 AM on October 6, 2010