11192 Why Do Onions Make You Cry? Thu Jul 03 14:55:00 -0700 2008 http://www.chow.com/stories/11192 Thu, 03 Jul 2008 21:55:00 GMT It's because they're so irritating It's because they're so irritating. http://www.chow.com/assets/2008/05/NQ_105_3.jpg Michele Foley 62 Nagging Question 1 When an onion is ruptured—such as by a knife—its cells break open and release irritating compounds that form a substance called propanethial sulfoxide, which is similar to sulfuric acid, says Dr. Irwin Goldman, associate professor of horticulture at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

As the nerve endings of your eyes’ corneas detect the irritant, your brain tells your eyes to produce tears to wash it away. In other words, all that crying is your body’s way of protecting your eyes. (It also seems to help if you block the cornea by wearing goggles—or even contact lenses. Or you could try CHOW contributor Daniel Duane’s method.)

Using “gene silencing” technology, Dr. Colin Eady of Crop & Food Research in New Zealand recently developed a tearless onion by shutting down the gene in the vegetable that produces the irksome substance. It’s still in the development stage, however, and there’s no word yet on whether the new onion tastes better or worse than its weepy relative.

CHOW’s Nagging Question column appears every Friday.

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