Close-up of the fruits produced by a native avocado tree. (IMAGE)
Caption
Close-up of the fruits produced by a native avocado tree growing on the side of the road in Chiapas, Mexico.
Archaeobotanist Kevin Wann, who conducted the research as a fellow at the museum, and his colleagues examined DNA from avocado leaves collected in Nicaragua, Honduras and southern Mexico. They also spoke with the farmers and gardeners to learn how they cultivate these local avocados.
“There is a much wider breadth of avocado diversity that science had not yet documented,” said Wann, who is now pursuing his doctorate in the Department of Anthropology in the College of Arts and Sciences at Texas A&M and had never eaten an avocado before this project. “We could potentially tap into this genetic diversity to conserve commercial avocado plants that are vulnerable to disease.”
Increasing the genetic diversity of avocados is crucial to protecting the multi-billion-dollar industry surrounding the fruit. Wann thinks the trove of avocado diversity preserved in Central America’s lowlands could help protect commercial avocados from the fate of other clonal crops like bananas, which have been devastated by fungal pathogens in the past. The region’s local varieties are also adapted to warmer and wetter climates.
Credit
Kevin Wann, 2024 Missing Migrants Project
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