The banana is an elongated fruit, botanically a berry, produced by large treelike herbaceous plants in the genus Musa. The earliest domestication took place in New Guinea, where Papuan cultivators selected naturally seedless individuals of the wild species Musa banksii; archaeological evidence from the Kuk Swamp site places this cultivation at roughly 10,000 to 6,500 years before present. Most modern edible bananas, including the commercially dominant Cavendish group, descend from Musa acuminata alone or from its hybrids with Musa balbisiana. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/
Facts
Scientific NameMusa spp., principally derived from M. acuminata and M. balbisiana 1 Domestication RegionNew Guinea (from wild Musa banksii) 1 Domesticated When (Circa)Circa 10,000 to 6,500 years before present (Kuk Swamp site evidence) 1 Era
Era (category) Connections
Associated With
Banana bunchy top virus is one of the most economically damaging banana diseases worldwide.
Black Sigatoka is the most damaging foliar disease of banana and plantain.
The burrowing nematode (Radopholus similis) is a major root pathogen of cultivated banana.
This milestone records the domestication event of the banana crop it is directly named for.
Panama disease Tropical Race 4, a fusarium wilt, threatens the Cavendish banana that dominates world export production.
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Source Banana (Wikipedia)
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Sources
1. Banana (Wikipedia)
Wikimedia Foundation- lead section, Domestication
lead description or Wikipedia lead (primary-uses)
Most modern edible bananas, including the commercially dominant Cavendish group, descend from Musa acuminata alone or from its hybrids with Musa balbisiana.
History section
Numerous phytoliths of bananas have been recovered from the Kuk Swamp archaeological site and dated to around 10,000 to 6,500 BP.
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