Newswise — Boston (September 18, 2025) – Tonight at Boston University, two scientists from the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia were honored with the 2025 Ig Nobel Prize in Biology for their landmark 1991 study published in Pediatrics.
Riffing on the august Nobel Prizes, the Ig Nobel Prize is a “tongue-in-cheek” award that celebrates scientific research that, amuses at first glance, but provokes deeper reflection, highlighting the unexpected and creative side of science. Now in their 35th year, the awards underscore the enduring power of pairing good-natured humor with compelling scientific storytelling that “makes people laugh, then think.”
The award-winning study, “Maternal diet alters the sensory qualities of human milk and the nursling’s behavior,” was conducted by Julie A. Mennella, PhD, and her then postdoctoral mentor Gary K. Beauchamp, PhD. The research revealed that when lactating mothers ate garlic, their breast milk took on its aroma—and, contrary to common belief at the time, babies liked it, nursing longer when the milk was garlic-flavored than when it was bland and devoid of garlic notes.
“We chose garlic for these early experiments because research had established that dairy cows thriving on wild garlic produced milk that carried its aroma,” said Mennella. “Yet at the time, it was widely believed that human milk should be bland, and folklore warned mothers to avoid garlic while breastfeeding for fear that babies would reject their milk.” This simple, yet elegant, study provided a dramatic example of how insights from animal behavior research inform human biology: young mammals imprint on flavors very early in life.
Building on this work, Mennella—now a Monell faculty Member—and Beauchamp, Distinguished faculty Member and Emeritus Director, went on to discover that eating garlic during pregnancy altered the aroma of amniotic fluid and that a wide variety of flavors transmit into these first foods. What began as an unexpected discovery about garlic laid the scientific groundwork for decades of research uncovering how early-life flavor experiences shape emerging food preferences and influence cultural food practices across generations and around the world.
As Beauchamp reflects, “this deep connection among flavor, memory, and identity was beautifully and succinctly captured by Oliver Sacks in his posthumously published essay, “Filter Fish,” most aptly in its last sentence: ‘[The flavor of] gefilte fish will usher me out of this life, as it ushered me into it, 82 years ago.’”
Mennella and Beauchamp presented their work in a tightly timed, 60-second Ig Nobel acceptance speech. At the ceremony, Benjamin Smith, PhD, Monell’s Executive Director & President, and a co-recipient of the 2005 Ig Nobel Prize in Biology for his research smelling frogs, delivered a “24/7 Lecture.” In just 24 seconds, he offered a semi-technical summary of how smell and taste relate to this year’s Ig Nobel ceremony theme of Digestion and then distilled it into seven catchy words.
“Using humor to communicate fundamental science in a relatable way is essential and needs to be celebrated,” said Smith
Mennella and Beauchamp were honored to receive the Ig Nobel in Biology this year. They both hope that the humorous side of their work helps open the eyes, as well as the noses and mouths, of others to the wonders of science and the importance of supporting it.
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About Monell Chemical Senses Center
The Monell Chemical Senses Center is an independent nonprofit research institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was founded in 1968 to advance and share discoveries in the science of the chemical senses of smell, taste, chemesthesis, and interoception to solve the world’s health, societal, and environmental challenges.
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