SCIENTISTS have made a surprising discovery revealing that an ancient genetic union approximately 9 million years ago gave rise to the potato, which is now the world’s third-largest staple crop. Remarkably, the tomato has been identified as the maternal ancestor of the potato.

The study was conducted by a research team from the Agricultural Genomics Institute in Shenzhen under the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, alongside a researcher from Lanzhou University, in collaboration with scientists from Canada and the U.K.

Their findings show that the potato originated from an ancient hybridization event between the tomato plant and a potato-like species about 9 million years ago. This genetic fusion also led to the development of a novel organ: the tuber.

Published in the latest issue of the journal Cell, these findings offer a groundbreaking theoretical framework for the genetic breeding of potatoes.

Potatoes, the world’s most important tuber crop, are native to South America. Valued for their high nutritional content and remarkable adaptability, they have since spread worldwide.

Huang Sanwen, the study’s lead author, explained that the origin of potatoes had long been a scientific mystery. To solve this mystery, the research team analyzed 101 genomes and 349 resequenced samples from cultivated potatoes and 56 wild potato species — essentially conducting a comprehensive DNA paternity test for all potatoes.

They discovered that all potatoes examined carried stable, balanced genetic contributions from both Etuberosum and the tomato plant, leading them to conclude that potatoes are hybrid offspring of these two species.

To confirm this hypothesis, the team assessed the divergence times of the three species. Their results showed that Etuberosum and tomato began diverging around 14 million years ago, and 5 million years later, they hybridized. This event gave rise to the earliest tuber-bearing potato plants around 9 million years ago. (Xinhua)