Lollipops Meet Lasers in This Lab

What do you get when you combine three mathematicians, lollipops, and lasers? You might end up with a paper called “Shape dynamics and scaling laws for a body dissolving in fluid flow.” Yes, this is real science. Science documentary producer Emily Driscoll stopped by the researchers’ Willy Wonka-like lab to see what lollipops can teach us about fluid dynamics. It’s the topic of her new video for The Macroscope, “The Lollipop Hypothesis.” Oh, and in case you’re wondering: We will get to that age-old question: “How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop?” We posed that question to you in our SciFri Lollipop Challenge.