FLICKR, MITCH PONDScientists who brushed the backs of baby rats nearly 40 years ago are among the winners of this year’s Golden Goose Awards. Their work led to the finding that massage could promote the survival and growth of premature human infants.
Representative Jim Cooper (D-TN) partnered with a group of science organizations, including the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), to establish the Golden Goose Awards in 2012. The awards honor federally funded discoveries that may seem frivolous at first, but later yield important benefits to society.
In 1979, the late Saul Schanberg, a neuroscientist at Duke University, was using baby rats to study factors that influence levels of growth hormone and ornithine decarboxylase, both growth indicators. Working with graduate student Cynthia Kuhn and technician Gary Evoniuk, Schanberg was conducting experiments that required separating the pups from their mothers.
Although the animals were well-fed and had healthy body temperatures, the abandoned pups stopped growing; their growth marker levels plummeted. Exposing the babies to their ...
