Okay, What About a THREE-Second Rule? No?

Image courtesy of Wikipedia Commons

Believe us, it gives us no pleasure to debunk this one. We cannot count the number of times when we've dropped a particularly delectable morsel of food, scooped it up, triumphantly declared “Five Second Rule!”, and popped it into our mouth.  The Five Second Rule, of course, is the well known scientific law that states food on the ground can't be contaminated in less than five seconds, and is therefore perfectly safe to eat.

And then came Jillian Clarke, biologist and semi professional spoilsport. Through a series of experiments at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign,  Ms. Clarke demonstrated that even dry foods can be contaminated in 5 seconds or less, a depressing finding that won her the 2004 Ig Nobel prize.  In 2006, further research confirmed that food does indeed get contaminated in less than 5 seconds, and foods with higher levels of microbiota (tiny living organisms) such as meat, cheese and vegetables will contaminate at a faster rate than dry foods. 

By the way, the Ig Nobel Prizes, originally awarded by the Journal of Irreproducible Results, acknowledge and award 10 real achievements in science, medicine, technology and 7 other fields that “first make people laugh, and then make them think”. Recent awards have been presented (really!) for:

• refining methods for whale snot collection by remote control helicopters
• research confirming that that microbes do in fact cling to bearded scientists, and
• the discovery that some asthma symptoms can be treated with a roller-coaster ride.

By special guest science contributor Julia Prokopick