The claw grip that keeps your coffee safe in its cup

IT would probably be more sensible to sit still and enjoy your mug of coffee.

But for the modern multi-tasker who insists on walking around the home or office with their drink, inevitably spilling it as they go, scientists have come up with a perfect solution based on physics equations, lab experiments and test walks.

It seems we have been carrying our cups and mugs all wrong, holding them at the side. The scientists say that by holding the cup at the side, we exacerbate the force at which the coffee hits the inside of the vessel and so maximise the odds of spilling our drink.

A simple change of grip reduces the force and keeps the coffee in the cup. Writing in the journal Achievements in Life Sciences, the South Korean researchers recommend the ‘claw hand’, pictured.

This technique involves putting your hand over the top of the cup while gripping it just below the rim.

Naturally, anyone employing the claw grip runs the risk of being scalded by the steam coming off their coffee, and flimsier cardboard cups may collapse under the pressure.

But the technique may be preferable to the other solution suggested by the researcher Jiwon Han – walking backwards.

Mr Han, of the Korean Minjok Leadership Academy, said: ‘By walking backwards, we are able to significantly change the frequency characteristics of our hand motion… leading to a subsequent decrease in the probability of coffee spilling.

‘Of course, walking backwards may be less practical.

‘A few trials will soon reveal that walking backwards drastically increases the chance of tripping on a stone or crashing into a passing colleague, who may also be walking backwards.

‘This would most definitely lead to spillage.’