Sauce of satisfaction

Scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have come up with an invention that promises to end one of the great recurring frustrations of modern life. The LiquiGlide Ketchup Bottle employs an edible lubricant that promises to smooth the tomato sauce's passage from bottle to plate.

Condiment lovers will no longer have to bash the bottle to initiate a frustratingly slow flow, or employ a knife to tease the stuff out.

As Britain's Telegraph newspaper reported this week, the innovation - which can also be used for mayonnaise and mustard, in either glass and plastic bottles - is one of more than 90 objects to be celebrated at the Designs of the Year exhibition, at the Design Museum in London.

The LiquiGlide does not do quite as great a service to mankind as another winner, ColaLife, an innovation that allows vital medicines to be transported for free in rural Africa in the spaces between bottles in Coca-Cola crates. Nor is it as striking as still another winner, London's controversial Shard skyscraper. But LiquiGlide is certainly a victory for the common man.

There's just one question: will it be so efficient that the boffins will have to develop some new way to stop the ketchup all coming out at once?