Fun science prizes launched to push science popularization

 　　HANGZHOU, April 8 (Xinhua) -- A ceremony was held here Saturday evening to give away China's first "Pineapple Science Prize", which is designed to honor researches with great imagination and to arouse the public enthusiasm for science.

　　Jointly¹ launched by China's most popular science and technology social network Guokr.com and Zhejiang Provincial² Science and Technology Museum, the first Pineapple Science Prize is expected to promote the country's science popularization.

　　The awards cover researches in five fields including physics, chemistry, medicine and biology, mathematics, and psychology³.

　　A research proves that counting money has the power to ease pains won the award of psychology. Winner Zhou Xinyue, a professor with the Department of Psychology of Sun Yat-Sen University, published her paper on Nature.

　　"I designed an experiment to let people count money before dipping their hands into hot water to see how long they can insist on. This experiment was repeated by BBC in a documentary with cold water to tell the affection of money," Zhou said.

　　The Medical and Biological Award was given to the research of "Y chromosome⁴ clues to the ancestry⁵ of Emperor Cao Cao," jointly published by researchers from MOE Key Laboratory of Contemporary Anthropology⁶, School of Life Sciences and Department of History, Fudan University, and CAS-MPG Partner Institute for Computational Biology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

　　The prize was awarded by Barry Marshall, Australian physician and Nobel Prize laureate in Physiology⁷ or Medicine, and Professor of Clinical Microbiology at the University of Western Australia. Marshall is well known for showing that the bacterium⁸ Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) is the cause of most peptic ulcers⁹, reversing decades of medical doctrine¹⁰ holding that ulcers were caused by stress, spicy¹¹ foods, and too much acid.

　　"We are trying to map out the whole stemma tree of the whole nation, and Cao's family was picked up to be the first as Cao Cao's tomb became a newsmaker in early 2010," said one of the paper's writers named Yan Shi from Fudan University.

　　The Physics Award went to the manipulator controlled by money brain, the Mathematics Award to robot dancing at the Spring Festival Gala and the Chemistry Award to the research of chicken soup nutritive materials.

　　Except for the five awards, the Pineapple prize has another four awards including two special awards of invention and fantasy, as well as two awards to the person or group who have made great contribution to science popularization.

　　"We name the prize with pineapple, as this nutritive fruit has a bright color and pleasing taste while shaped in a strange way, which indicates that the prize is pleasing, interest, nourishing and a little bit strange ," said Ji Shisan, real name Xiaohua, founder¹² and CEO of Guokr.com.

　　"Pineapple Science Prize is a salute¹³ to curiosity. It is the curiosity which lead the humans to one scientific research and another, and it is also the curiosity which takes the mankind to survive till today," said Wang Yami, executive organizer of the prize from Guokr.com.

　　"Imagination is encouraged here, as it is not only a research award. The Imagination can be real science in the future," Wang said.

　　The winners are all real scientists with real papers published on professional science magazines or presented to academic conferences, at the same time, the expert jury comprises top-level Chinese scientists, Ji Shisan said.

　　Pineapple Science Prize, with the slogan of "Laugh and Think," was designed differently from 'Ig Nobel Prize.'

　　"I was inspired by the 'Ig Nobel Prize,' but decided¹⁴ to make the prize more acclimatized to China. By launching the prize, we hope more people will get to know science and science will become more popular among the public," Ji said.

　　"Some research topics seem to be weird¹⁵ but actually have deep meaning, which inspires us in a different way. The topics might by funny, but the research method should be serious and scientific," Zhou Xinyue said.

1 jointly   

ad.联合地，共同地

参考例句：

• Tenants are jointly and severally liable for payment of the rent. 租金由承租人共同且分别承担。
• She owns the house jointly with her husband. 她和丈夫共同拥有这所房子。

2 provincial   

adj.省的，地方的；n．外省人，乡下人

参考例句：

• City dwellers think country folk have provincial attitudes.城里人以为乡下人思想迂腐。
• Two leading cadres came down from the provincial capital yesterday.昨天从省里下来了两位领导干部。

3 psychology   

n.心理，心理学，心理状态

参考例句：

• She has a background in child psychology.她受过儿童心理学的教育。
• He studied philosophy and psychology at Cambridge.他在剑桥大学学习哲学和心理学。

4 chromosome   

n.染色体

参考例句：

• Chromosome material with exhibits of such behaviour is called heterochromatin.表现这种现象的染色体物质叫做异染色质。
• A segment of the chromosome may become lost,resulting in a deletion.染色体的一个片段可能会丢失，结果产生染色体的缺失。

5 ancestry   

n.祖先，家世

参考例句：

• Their ancestry settled the land in 1856.他们的祖辈1856年在这块土地上定居下来。
• He is an American of French ancestry.他是法国血统的美国人。

6 anthropology   

n.人类学

参考例句：

• I believe he has started reading up anthropology.我相信他已开始深入研究人类学。
• Social anthropology is centrally concerned with the diversity of culture.社会人类学主要关于文化多样性。

7 physiology   

n.生理学，生理机能

参考例句：

• He bought a book about physiology.他买了一本生理学方面的书。
• He was awarded the Nobel Prize for achievements in physiology.他因生理学方面的建树而被授予诺贝尔奖。

8 bacterium   

n.(pl.)bacteria 细菌

参考例句：

• The bacterium possibly goes in the human body by the mouth.细菌可能通过口进入人体。
• A bacterium is identified as the cause for his duodenal ulcer.一种细菌被断定为造成他十二指肠溃疡的根源。

9 ulcers   

n.溃疡( ulcer的名词复数 )；腐烂物；道德败坏；腐败

参考例句：

• Detachment of the dead cells produces erosions and ulcers. 死亡细胞的脱落，产生糜烂和溃疡。 来自辞典例句
• 75% of postbulbar ulcers occur proximal to the duodenal papilla. 75％的球后溃疡发生在十二指肠乳头近侧。 来自辞典例句

10 doctrine   

n.教义；主义；学说

参考例句：

• He was impelled to proclaim his doctrine.他不得不宣扬他的教义。
• The council met to consider changes to doctrine.宗教议会开会考虑更改教义。

11 spicy   

adj.加香料的；辛辣的，有风味的

参考例句：

• The soup tasted mildly spicy.汤尝起来略有点辣。
• Very spicy food doesn't suit her stomach.太辣的东西她吃了胃不舒服。

12 Founder   

n.创始者，缔造者

参考例句：

• He was extolled as the founder of their Florentine school.他被称颂为佛罗伦萨画派的鼻祖。
• According to the old tradition,Romulus was the founder of Rome.按照古老的传说，罗穆卢斯是古罗马的建国者。

13 salute   

vi.行礼，致意，问候，放礼炮；vt.向…致意，迎接，赞扬；n.招呼，敬礼，礼炮

参考例句：

• Merchant ships salute each other by dipping the flag.商船互相点旗致敬。
• The Japanese women salute the people with formal bows in welcome.这些日本妇女以正式的鞠躬向人们施礼以示欢迎。

14 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

15 weird   

adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的

参考例句：

• From his weird behaviour,he seems a bit of an oddity.从他不寻常的行为看来，他好像有点怪。
• His weird clothes really gas me.他的怪衣裳简直笑死人。