Untangling the genetic legacy of tomato domestication
Thursday, May 18, 2017 - 13:31
in Biology & Nature
Favorable mutations that went along with increased fruit size and other beneficial traits in tomato plants do not always play well together. A study published in Cell found that natural mutations in two important tomato genes that were selected for different purposes in breeding can cause extreme branching and reduce fruit yield when they occur in the same plant. The researchers used those genes to create a tomato plant that grows more tomatoes.