According to a recent research in Frontiers in Plant Science, bananas may have a more intricate past than previously imagined.
Sterile bananas generate seedless fruit. The relationship between the original seed-filled fruits and grocery store bananas is unclear.
Here, we demonstrate that most diploid farmed bananas descended from M. acuminata are hybrids.
At least three wild'mystery forebears' must have contributed to this hybrid genome thousands of years ago
said Dr. Julie Sardos, the study's primary author from The Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT in Montpellier, France.
The shift from wild to cultivated bananas was facilitated through genetic engineering, especially hybridization and heterozygote selection.