Mysteries of Life: I’ll be sticking with peppers

From 538 Significant Digits:

11 million years ago

It was, if you can believe it, only 11 million years ago that tomatoes split away from peppers, evolutionarily speaking. But now, thanks to gene editing technology, scientists may be able to activate genes already lying dormant in tomatoes to, yes, make tomatoes spicy again. [Gizmodo]

It does sound like genetic editing fun, doesn’t it? But there are already so many peppers — spicy and not spicy. And what about all the jars of hot pepper mushes in my spice cabinet? And the jar of harissa I just made?

A suggestion: why don’t you gene editing lab guys work on restoring the flavor of actual tomatoes? I’ll be pleased to donate my current tomato collection (tasting like tomato-tasting cardboard) as guinea pigs.

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