Experimental replication shows knives manufactured from frozen human feces do not work

Eren, Metin I.; Bebber, Michelle R.; Norris, James D.; Perrone, Alyssa; Rutkoski, Ashley; Wilson, Michael C.; Raghanti, Mary Ann

doi:10.1016/j.jasrep.2019.102002

Cited by 7 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 7 publications

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“…Moreover, the most highly Tweeted article was Eren et al (2019) (3069 Tweets; Metin Eren, Michelle Bebber, James Norris, Alyssa Perrone, Ashley Rutkoski, Michael Wilson, and Mary Ann Raghanti; USA and UK; 2020 Ig Nobel Prize in Materials Science), which tested and revoked the claim that knives manufactured from frozen human faeces could be functional for cutting, based on two knife designs and faeces from two subjects.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Not just nickel-and-dime: An analysis of journal articles winning Ig Nobel prize during 2011–2020

Yeung

2022

MJLIS

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Ig Nobel prize is a satirical award given to achievements that are unusual, imaginative, and frequently produced in the form of journal articles. It was largely unknown how these award-winning articles were disseminated in the community in terms of academic citations and social media attentions. This study evaluated all journal articles winning the award during the period of 2011–2020 for their citation and social media performance metrics. There were 89 Ig Nobel prize-winning journal articles indexed by Scopus. On average, they were cited 42.5 ± 102.4 times, published in journals with mean impact factor of 3.476 ± 4.102, and mentioned 947.3 ± 2887.2 times and 263.2 ± 502.7 times on Facebook and Twitter, respectively. Over half of them were published in the first quartile journals and awarded within 2 years since publication. Though Ig Nobel prize was originally intended to be satirical, prize-winning articles themselves were indeed impactful in the academia.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Not just nickel-and-dime: An analysis of journal articles winning Ig Nobel prize during 2011–2020

Yeung

2022

MJLIS

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“…The incorporation of urea was found to increase the compressive strength of the HSA-ERBs by up to 300% (UCS of 39.7 MPa), whilst also increasing the density and light-atom contentwhich would likely improve the radiation-shielding potential of the materials. [7] The demonstration that frozen human faeces does not produce effective knives recently won the 2020 Ig Nobel prize for Materials Science; [13,14] however, the low Martian surface temperatures (as low as -63 °C) and pressures could potentially make frozen or desiccated faeces-based tools feasibleespecially if combined as a composite material with Martian regolith and other humanderived feedstocks such HSA or urea. Unfortunately, due to health and safety concerns, we were unable to explore human faeces-based ERBs in this study.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Blood, Sweat and Tears: Extraterrestrial Regolith Biocomposites with in Vivo Binders

Roberts

Whittall²,

Breitling³

et al. 2021

Preprint

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In this work, we explore the use of human serum albumin (HSA) – a common protein obtained from blood plasma – as a binder for simulated Lunar and Martian regolith to produce so-called extraterrestrial regolith biocomposites (ERBs). In essence, HSA produced by astronauts in vivo could be extracted on a semi-continuous basis and combined with Lunar or Martian regolith to produce a concrete-like material. Employing a simple fabrication strategy, HSA-based ERBs were produced and displayed compressive strengths as high as 25.0 MPa. For comparison, standard concrete typically has a compressive strength ranging between 20 and 32 MPa. The incorporation of urea – which could be extracted from the urine, sweat or tears of astronauts – could further increase the compressive strength by over 300% in some instances, with the best-performing formulation having an average compressive strength of 39.7 MPa. Furthermore, we demonstrate that HSA-ERBs can be 3D-printed, opening up an interesting potential avenue for extraterrestrial construction using human-derived feedstocks. The mechanism of adhesion was investigated and attributed to the dehydration-induced reorganisation of the protein secondary structure into a densely hydrogen-bonded, supramolecular β-sheet network – analogous to the cohesion mechanism of spider silk. For comparison, synthetic spider silk and bovine serum albumin (BSA) were also investigated as regolith binders – which could also feasibly be produced on a Martian colony with future advancements in biomanufacturing technology.<br>

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Leusmann¹

2021

Nachr Chem

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Experimental replication shows knives manufactured from frozen human feces do not work

Cited by 7 publications

References 7 publications

Not just nickel-and-dime: An analysis of journal articles winning Ig Nobel prize during 2011–2020

Not just nickel-and-dime: An analysis of journal articles winning Ig Nobel prize during 2011–2020

Blood, Sweat and Tears: Extraterrestrial Regolith Biocomposites with in Vivo Binders

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