Why Scientists Put 5,000 Strawberries to the Taste Test

University of Florida researchers are going all in to help grow tastier strawberries.

For his doctoral dissertation, Mark Porter, a recent Ph.D. graduate in Plant Breeding from UF’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS), led novel research in which he and his faculty advisors found groups of genes that will enable them to develop the tastiest strawberries.

Porter and his fellow researchers went into the fields of the UF/IFAS Gulf Coast Research and Education Center. There, they tasted more than 5,000 strawberries during two growing seasons.

Scientists scored the fruit on a scale of one to five – for flavor, sweetness, and sourness.

Additionally, they used chemical analysis to capture the aroma from 400 varieties.

Next, they used DNA information to identify genes that control aroma. In the best case, it’s like the color of your eyes; they’re controlled by a single gene.

To find flavor genes, the whole genome of a strawberry — which has about 100,000 genes — needs to be examined.

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Scientists found genes controlling peachy and caramel aromas that strawberry consumers prefer and developed DNA tests to rapidly identify those genes.

“That will translate to enhanced flavor and smell of strawberries,” Porter says. “With this research, we can select new strawberry varieties with better aroma, using the DNA tests before they even bear fruit.”

For more, continue reading at blogs.ifas.ufl.edu.