Plant breeders aim for more flavorful strawberry

“On the agronomical trip to market, strawberries have lost some of their flavor,” says Wired, noting the adjustments made over the decades to produce a bright-colored, slick-skinned, large-sized berry that is easy to pick and stays in condition. “Supermarket berries are bred for size, color, shelf-life, and disease-resistance. But a new breed of … er … breeders wants to bring glory back to the strawberry, amping up classical breeding techniques with modern genetics,” and tools such as DNA sequencing.

Flavor is derived from many components – texture, sugar content, types of sugar, aromatics, acids and fragance. DNA sequencing helps breeders identify the genes behind desirable traits. UC-Davis and U-Florida are the leading breeders of strawberries, the fifth-most-popular fruit in the country. The lead researchers at the two universities eschew genetic engineering. “Besides the complications in marketing anything with a whiff of genetic engineering, flavor is too complicated to engineer in cut-and-paste fashion,” says Wired.

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