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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsCampbell's soup changed tomatoes' DNA and opened up a can of mystery
Genetic editing could theoretically help farmers grow the most delicious food. Using CRISPR technology, which allows scientists to cut and paste desired or unwanted traits, researchers could design ideal cropsgreat-tasting, nutritious, aesthetically beautiful, and better than anything previously known.
To do that, scientists need a better understanding of genetics. For all of the modern advances, genes remain something of a mystery. Experiments with selective breeding dont always yield expected results, as a new study in Nature Plants shows. Researchers from Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York just solved a decades-long mystery surrounding tomato plant mutations. They call it a cautionary tale for crop gene editing.
The perfect tomato to eat is red, plump, juicy, and bursting with flavor. When mass-produced, tomatoes also have to be easy to remove from the vine. That is why the Campbell Soup Company cultivated a variety with a genetic mutation more than a half century ago.
The one prized by Campbell is jointless, with no bend in the stem from the vine to the tomato. In the 1960s, the companys growers noticed that a natural mutation in some plants yielded fruits that separated from the vine right where the green cap and stem touch. With the nubby stubs detached, the fruit was less likely to bruise and puncture in transit, making the jointless mutated tomatoes ideal for large-scale production. Growers, eager for convenience, soon introduced the jointless mutation, known as j2, into all kinds of tomato varieties.
There was a catch
more....
https://qz.com/1612644/how-campbells-soup-changed-tomato-dna-for-the-worse/amp/
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Campbell's soup changed tomatoes' DNA and opened up a can of mystery (Original Post)
yuiyoshida
May 2019
OP
2naSalit
(86,636 posts)1. There's always a ctach
when you mess with mother nature.
The Velveteen Ocelot
(115,716 posts)2. It's not nice to fool Mother Nature.
progressoid
(49,991 posts)3. Rec
Theyre hoping to make cryptic mutations less mysterious so that CRISPR is used to improve on nature and cultivation becomes less of a crap shoot.
We've been fooling mother nature for thousands of years. And with the threats we face, we are going to need technology to help us if we want to continue as a species.
CrispyQ
(36,470 posts)4. Store bought tomatoes at a typical grocery store are--gross.
They look lovely, all pretty & red & flawless, & of the same shape & size, almost to perfection. But they are hard, & if you do find one that is "ripe" it will be full of a white pithy WTF substance, not tomato, & it won't smell of tomato & it will barely taste of tomato.