Give me the reason

Discussion in 'Plants: Science and Cultivation' started by ahmad, Jan 1, 2006.

  1. ahmad

    ahmad Member

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    How can cross fertelize the potato flower a tomato flower why it happens? how it happens? please tell me the reason thoroughly and why its fruit is poisonous
     
  2. Weedbender

    Weedbender Active Member 10 Years

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    I'd like to know that as well if it's true.
     
  3. ahmad

    ahmad Member

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    yes its true and the fruit is called topato
     
  4. jimmyq

    jimmyq Well-Known Member 10 Years

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    Ahmad, can you give us a link to some information that proves this statement? I would be interested to read it.
     
  5. Dee M.

    Dee M. Active Member 10 Years

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  6. cactologist

    cactologist Member

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    DeeM is of course correct that the Topato is a gimmick. However the idea of hybridizing a potato and a tomato was widely explored in the 1980's. Because the 2 plants are closely related botanically several groups were able to create viable hybrids (generally called a 'pomato') but none produced edible fruits and edible tubers. In fact, as I remember it, the hybrids combined the worst of both producing neither edible fruit nor edible tubers. But you can quite easily graft a tomato plant onto potato roots and get both. Such experiments in hybridizing have now been replaced by genetic engineering.
     
  7. pierrot

    pierrot Active Member 10 Years

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    The fruit may be poisonous if maternal genetic characters are passed on. i.e. if the potato fruit is poisonous, as it is, and the maternal parent is the potato could we be seeing the maternal genome being expressed and the paternal tomato genes just causing the fruit to be bigger and a different colour from the usual Potato fruit?

    is it then a case of meternal inherritance/

    just my thoughts

    pierrot
     
  8. swgraham

    swgraham Active Member UBC Botanical Garden

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    Hi Pierrot,

    A hybrid plant will get two sets of genes from its parents (both 'paternal' and 'maternal' genome contributions, from sperm and egg, respectively). Which particular genes get expressed in a hybrid offspring cannot usually be predicted by whether they originally came from sperm (from pollen) or egg cell (which can be found inside each unfertilized ovule). Instead, it mostly depends on (unpredictable) "genetic dominance" patterns that exists among and within the genes of diploid organisms (organisms with two sets of genomes in each cell) like you, me and tomatoes.

    So, I'm not sure what you mean by 'maternal inheritance' being able to explain which characters we see expressed in potato/ tomato hybrids. In humans and some other 'dioecious' organisms ('dioecy' means that there are separate male and female individuals, rather than hermaphrodites), there are genes that are 'sex-linked' (e.g., those that are passed on exclusively through the X-chromosome of humans). In contrast, members of Solanaceae (the potato/ tomato/ eggplant family) are generally hermaphroditic.

    It's true that most hermaphroditic organisms (like Solanaceae) have a small number of genes that are strictly maternally inherited. These special genes are situated in the small genome found in the chloroplast, the tiny organelles in each plant cell that perform photosynthesis. However, these chloroplast genes are mostly concerned with photosynthesis -- not toxin production.

    Hope this helps,

    S.
     
  9. pierrot

    pierrot Active Member 10 Years

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    Thank you Sean for the information.

    I looked back at the original question that was asking

    "How can cross fertelize the potato flower a tomato flower why it happens? how it happens? please tell me the reason thoroughly and why its fruit is poisonous"

    I guess I was thinking that if the fruit we see as a tomato or berry is a ripened ovary (not a true product of fertilization but influenced by) and this is from the maternal plant ... is the poisonous nature of green parts of the potato conferred to the fruit?

    the only part of the plant that is a product of fertilization is the seeds correct and so the genes as you explained will be active in these seeds.

    I guess that was what I was thinking of

    anyway than you again for refreshing my meager knowledge of genetics

    Pierrot
     
  10. swgraham

    swgraham Active Member UBC Botanical Garden

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    Hi Pierrot, although individual seeds are always a mix of maternal and offspring tissues, it's quite possible that an individual seed that results from an initial fertilization/ hybridization event, in this situation, won't produce much, if any, toxin.

    When that hybrid seed grows into a mature plant and produces its own fruit, its fruit tissue (barring the parts of each *its* seed that derive from the next generation of offspring) will contain exactly the same genomes/ genes as the green parts of this 'maternal' plant... but the actual expression of an individual's genes (including those producing toxins) can (and usually do) vary by tissue, so whether this fruit (or seed) is poisonous or not can only be determined by testing.

    By the way, the genes that produce a fruit are not just 'maternal genes'. Although many of them will be fruit-specific, a good number of the same genes will also be expressed in the same individual's stamens during pollen production! So, it's perhaps easier to think of them as 'parental genes'!
     

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