Definitely a breakthrough for the modern cook here. Scientists in New Zealand and Japan were able to develop an onion that doesn't cause people to end up in tears. Using biotechnology, the scientists involved were able to switch off the gene behind the enzyme that made people cry.

More on this scientific breakthrough after the jump!

Here's an intriguing science story with a bit of a twist. It seems that a 15 year-old Australian girl switched blood types as an effect of a liver transplant she received when she was nine. According to the report, the girl "had changed blood types and that her immune system had switched over to that of the donor after stem cells from the new liver migrated to her bone marrow."

More on this amazing development after the jump!

If anyone were to tell you that there seemed to be an increased interest in sex, or perhaps promiscuity, in the world, you'd probably scoff at the idea. Despite this, however, there seems to be some truth to the matter as a new report over at the Telegraph explain.

It seems that 19-year olds are now the most likely age group to have an abortion in the UK, with 32 out of every 1000 getting one, according to Department of Health figures. There is also increased concern that the procedure is being seen as a form of contraception, due to an increase in the number of abortions among 16- to 18-year olds.

Here are some numbers for you to chew on: there were 193,737 abortions among women and girls in England and Wales last year, which meant an increase of 3.9% on the total for 2005 to 2006. In contrast, the rise between 2005 and 2004 was 0.4%. Strangely enough, 32% of those having an abortion noted that they had a previous procedure done on them before.

These numbers don't bode well for the UK government, which has spent a tidy sum on contraception education. Said Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley, "These are disappointing figures, especially on repeat abortions which further illustrates the failure of the Government's strategies on sexual health and teenage pregnancy."

It looks cool, and if it works, it'd be a boon to the environment as well. Needless to say, a lot of hopes are riding on Boeing's new blended-wing aircraft: the X-48B.

With the blended wing aircraft system , the fuselage and wings are combined onto one frame, taking away the need for a tail, as well as reducing drag and fuel consumption. This fuel-saving design could reduce fuel consumption by 30% and even allow for different types of military and commercial uses.

While conventional uses for the aircraft are far from feasible at the moment, it could be used as a fuel tanker and commercial airplane in as little as 20 years' time. Hopefully, this current test flight will pass with flying colors and get us all one step closer to a more fuel-efficient airspace.

There's a famous quote said by the folks at Discovery Channel's Mythbusters, and that's "I reject your reality and substitute my own." Well, Hollywood's been doing that for years, and someone at Neatorama's compiled a short list of real physical effects that have been rejected by Hollywood and substituted with something meant for effect.

There are a couple of notable ones, though. The one about shotgun blasts and karate kicks causing people to fly away isn't possible, for example, because every action should have an equal and opposite reaction; therefore, if you kick someone in the face, they'll only fly back as far away as you get thrown back by the awesomeness of your kick.

There's also the one about exploding artillery shells. In that case, artillery shells don't simply blow upwards: they scatter shrapnel all around. The only reason why people in movies survive artillery fire is because the explosions are set below ground, keeping anything that looks like killer metal away from actors' faces.

Oh, and on that final note... No one is really supposed to hear you scream in space. There's no air, remember?

  

Talk about hardcore homebrew. There's a guy who calls himself Refik and he's gone and done what we thought seems insane, yet fully plausible: he's made his very own electrocardiograph, or heart monitor.

Now, according to his explanation, he's also made something that could potentially kill you because of the electricity involved. He writes,

Before I continue to explain what I did, I would like to WARN you! 500mA (miliAmps) on 220V will completely destroy your nervous system (so run it from battery supply), check everything twice and you are responsible for it on you own.

The fact that he survived using it on himself is testament to his engineering abilities, though we're definitely hesitant to praise him for showing the schematics off for public use. Someone's bound to take a chance and screw this up. Still, snaps to him for pulling it off without dying of electric shock.

Britain might not have the love hotels, but they'll probably be finding ways to make the day of hearts work to their advantage with this new update from the medical industry. It seems that Britain's men will have the pleasure of purchasing erectile dysfunction medicine over the counter on February 14, Valentine's Day.

According to Reuters, three Boots pharmacies will be selling Viagra without a prescription. All those hopefuls will need is a certification from a pharmacist to get a starting supply:

Men aged between 30 and 65 suffering from erectile dysfunction will be able to buy four Viagra pills for 50 pounds (US$ 97) without having to get a prescription from a doctor first.

Instead, they will have a private consultation with a Boots pharmacist, when their medical history will be checked and measurements taken of their blood pressure, cholesterol and blood glucose levels.

That's a lot of cash for a bit of help with lovemaking. On the bright side, there's still going to be some screening, which should temper abusive libidos somewhat. With only one out of every ten men actually needing the drug, expect some men in Britain to be turned away from a quick fix.

QJ may have seemed down all day, but we were hard at work churning out the latest (and not-so-latest) news this side of the afterlife. When Joecool mentioned something about DNS attacks, we were all on the alert.

As Joecool mentioned on our comments for the downtime:

Not to mention today (rather yesterday now that i'm saying this), there was a huge attack on 3 out of 13 of the root DNS servers that run the internet, the largest global internet attack since 2002.

A little digging confirms his story. Apparently, three of the world's 13 computers responsible for managing a lot of the world's internet traffic was assailed by hackers for around 12 hours, one of the biggest attacks on the net since 2002. As Yahoo mentions,

The attacks appeared to target UltraDNS, the company that operates servers managing traffic for Web sites ending in "org" and some other suffixes, experts said. Officials with NeuStar Inc., which owns UltraDNS, confirmed only that it had observed an unusual increase in traffic.

Among the targeted "root" servers that manage global Internet traffic were ones operated by the Defense Department and the Internet's primary oversight body.

Well folks, now you know. If anyone knows who hacked the net, send them a prompt email asking them to stop. You made many World of Warcraft players around the world (and a few million Korean Starcraft players) cry.

It doesn't look like it does anything, but the picture on your right actually takes trash and turns it into energy. Some scientists over at Purdue University created this "tactical biorefinery," a generator that uses refuse as a main fuel source.

According to the scientists, the whole thing was made due to a request from the US military. The tactical biorefinery, however, can serve more than military purposes, such as in providing emergency power for relief operations and hospitals.

While diesel actually starts the process of creating power, the trash is what really gets the whole contraption going:

The machine separates food material into a bioreactor that uses the yeast ferments to create ethanol.

Other materials go to a gasifier and are converted into propane gas and methane, which then fuel the diesel engine that creates electricity. 

Purdue scientists also mention that the device may actually be more environmentally friendly, as the biomass-powered generator takes less diesel to run, and because plants absorb carbon dioxide, which is supposed to be one of its byproducts.

Dreams hard-fought and well-earned should have with them that sense of pride. After all, you did everything you could to fulfill it, right?

Well, what if your dream is hampered by a thing we call taxes. Worse still, what if your dream was supposed to be free? That's the reason why Brian Emmett had to give up his dreams of space flight for another day.

Emmett recently won a free trip to outer space through a contest sponsored by Oracle Corp. With the victory came some minor fame, and the troubles of "free" never being truly as free as it should be. You see, Emmett would have to report this victory of his income to the US government, and pay around US$ 25,000 in taxes. The IRS deems any contest winnings as taxable income, thereby turning free trips into very expensive bits of income.

In the end, Brian Emmett opted to give up the shot at winning rather than risk putting his family in debt. It's definitely not something you'd call fair, and while some people still praise companies for sponsoring these free flights into outer space, others like Brian Emmett are far more grounded in reality now.