New research finds the gene responsible for tomato flavor – a discovery that may lead to the creation of better tasting varieties.
Scientists may have found the key to supermarket tomatoes' missing flavor.
Researchers at UC Davis said they have found a gene responsible for better tasting heirloom tomatoes, which may allow old varieties to be redeveloped.
The gene, GLK2, was found by a team of researchers while they searched for why tomatoes had their color.
While looking at wild, dark green tomatoes from the 1950s, the team found that these tomatoes that carried GLK2 had higher soluble sugar contents, making them far tastier than current varieties.
The New York Times reported that a genetic mutation that made tomatoes red instead of green, also gave tomatoes a more bland flavor.
That mutation has been bred into common tomato varieties that we know today.
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“That mutation has been introduced into almost all modern tomatoes. Now we can say that in trying to make the fruit prettier, they reduced some of the important compounds that are linked to flavor," Harry Klee, a tomato researcher at the University of Florida in Gainesville told the New York Times.
The genetic change is said to cause 10 to 15 percent less sugar, said McClatchy.
Researchers warn that the discovery of the gene does not mean tomatoes will get tastier overnight.
"This won't solve the problems of why supermarket tomatoes taste the way they do," said Ann Powell, a biochemist at UC Davis and author of the study, reported the San Francisco Chronicle.
"And taste is also subjective."
It may mean, however, that the newly discovered heirloom tomato gene will one day make its way to supermarket shelves.
The findings were published in the journal Science.
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