Potatoes developed from tomatoes, the study reveals

That’s it. This is the news. Genome biologist Sanwin Huang He knows something or two about potatoes. But the last penetration of the potatoes may be more shocking it yet: potatoes descended from tomatoes.

in cell The HUANG team, which was published today, states that modern potatoes have probably appeared about 9 million years ago, when tomato plants were married to eturosum, which resemble potatoes common in Chile. The origin of modern potatoes has been scientists for years, but the new results finally give the plant’s genome closed-while a long belief that the potatoes were only descended from eturosum.

“Yes, we revealed that the tomatoes are the mother of potatoes,” Huang, Professor of Agricultural Genome at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, confirmed.

ETUBEROSUM, which is a type of wild potato, is very similar to potatoes that you may find on the grocery shelf. But it lacks a major element in the anatomy of potatoes: tuberculosis – a stretching structure of the trunk or root that allows potatoes and their relatives to store nutrients and reproduction. Huang explained that the genomic analyzes suggested that potatoes are shared with tomatoes.

This is what alluded to the scientists that the trio – the trio – the tomatoes, and the etuberosum – was linked, but the link was not completely clear. Even, this is, Huang team had a ground idea and decided to run with it. What if tomatoes and potatoes are already and not only linked to some random diver?

To test their hypothesis, Huang and his colleagues analyzed 450 genes of cultivated potatoes and 56 other species of wild potatoes, and built more than 3000 family trees to clarify the genetic relationship between modern potatoes, tomatoes and inpruesum. They found that 50.66 % of these family trees are listed in the tomato menu as a sister of Bitotta, the wild potato group with tubers. After that, they performed a large -scale statistical analysis to compare the tree against genetic data. The team realized that the most prominent scenario is that potatoes are a hybrid group of tomatoes and furoprosum, as tomatoes contribute greatly to the genetic makeup of the potatoes.

The most surprising thing was that the main genes of the formation of tubers in potatoes appeared as a mixture of genetic materials that they received from each father-of-Tirbiri tuberculosis. Specifically, tomatoes gave the gene that tells the plant to make tubers, while eturosum has gone on a gene that helps control the growth of tubers.

Huang added that this unique genetic path can lead to future agricultural innovations to breed potatoes that do not develop harmful mutations. But this is still in business, and the potato expert hopes to explore this genetic relationship in more detail.

Huang said: “The next time you eat potatoes, thank the tomatoes – the mother of the old potatoes, and perhaps,” Huang said. “DNA proves to be a family!”