Scientists are peeling back ancient layers of banana DNA in order to find the 'mystery ancestors' before they go extinct. It is believed that humans domesticated bananas for the first time 7,000 years ago on the island of New Guinea. However, the history of banana domestication is complicated, and
Scientists are peeling back ancient layers of banana DNA in order to find the “mystery ancestors” before they go extinct.
are hybrids between different subspecies. At least three extra wild ‘mystery ancestors’ must have contributed to this mixed genome thousands of years ago, but haven’t been identified yet,” said Dr. Julie Sardos, a scientist at The Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT in Montpellier, France, and the study’s first author.
Sardos and his team have a good idea of where to look for them: “Our genetic comparisons show that the first of these mystery ancestors must have come from the region between the Gulf of Thailand and west of the South China Sea. The second is from the region between north Borneo and the Philippines. The third, from the island of New Guinea.”Which useful traits these mystery ancestors might have contributed to domesticated bananas is not yet known.
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