When you open a can of chickpeas and fish out the chickpeas, you are in a history that began 10,000 years ago. The modern chickpea is the descendant of a wild Middle Eastern plant that was cultivated by humans around the same time as wheat and barley. Archaeologists have found chickpeas that appear to be domesticated and buried in the West Bank, so deep that they would have been grown before the inhabitants of one of history's longest occupied cities began to make pottery.
A study published last week in Nature suggests that the humble chickpea has had a rocky road to its present popularity, but that it is one of the largest plant genome sequencing efforts ever completed.
Patrick Edger, a professor of horticulture at Michigan State University, was not involved in the study.
The researchers think that after chickpeas were domesticated in Turkey, their cultivation may have stopped. The result is that chickpeas are descendants of a small group from a thousand years ago. Modern varieties grown by most farmers are at risk of failing under the stress of climate change because they are low in genetic diversity. The scientists hope to make it easier for plant breeders to bring diversity back into the chickpea's genes by mapping its genetic makeup in such rich detail.
In the past 15 years, chickpeas have become ubiquitous in American grocery stores, but they have been a staple crop in the developing world for a long time.
India is the world's largest producer of chickpeas, growing more than 10 million metric tons in 2019.
chickpeas have not received as much attention from breeders as corn has, due to their status as a developing world crop. The benefit of genetic information that might give breeders more control over what traits the beans will have is something that has been improved over the years by chickpea farmers.
In the present study, the researchers were able to sequence the chickpeas' DNA from different sources. They found a set of genes the plants had in common, as well as a wide variety of others, including some that hadn't been discovered before. The common genes are likely to handle the basic traits that all the plants share, while the unique genes may be able to protect against diseases. The researchers flagged some genes that may be helpful to modern chickpeas.
The way plant breeding works is that once a genetic trait is brought into a given variety, all the individuals will have the same tool to block infections. If a disease can get past the defense, the results could be disastrous.
The entire field will be wiped out.
He hopes that using the genes identified in the study and making sure that many different sets are represented in chickpea populations could be a protection against crop failures. If farmers wake up one day and find they need a chickpea that can thrive at 104 degrees datememe datememe is a process that should start now, using genetic information to speed the process. It needs to be gradual.
The study looks at the chickpea's genes to see what they tell us about its travels. The bean left the Middle East along independent routes to India and the Mediterranean. The scientists don't know why it might have declined in popularity for thousands of years.
Dr. Varshney said, "Maybe farmers thought, this is not useful."
According to the data, humans seem to have rediscovered the wonders of the chickpea about 400 years ago. You can be happy if they do it next time.
