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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowA group of Indiana University researchers hopes to make better chocolate—and improve the lives of farmers in some of the world's poorest regions—by tracking the DNA of a cacao tree.
A team from IU's Center for Genomics and Bioinformatics is part of a consortium that has completed the genomic structure of the Forasteo cacao tree, which is used to produce 80 percent to 90 percent of the world's chocolate.
IU researcher Keithanne Mockaitis told The Herald-Times of Bloomington that mapping the DNA sequence of the cacao tree may help farmers grow trees resistant to disease and could help identify markers for desirable flavor traits.
That could lead to economic benefits in the chocolate industry, which produces $17 billion in the U.S. alone and provides a livelihood for more than 6.5 million farmers in Africa, South America and Asia.
"The places in the world growing this stuff have a really vested interest in this for their economies," Mockaitis said. "To be able to plan an economy around a certain crop, you have to know it's going to be around."
The Cacao Genome Database project is funded by candy company Mars Inc. and also includes researchers from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, IBM, Clemson University, Washington State University, the National Center for Genome Resources, the nonprofit Public Intellectual Property Resources for Agriculture and the HudsonAlpha Institute.
Mockaitis said the cacao tree the team researched has about 35,000 genes. Humans have about 30,000 genes. Rice has about 40,000.
"When we do sequencing, it's not one big linear process. It's like a puzzle," Mockaitis said. "Parts of this project have been pretty challenging."
But the rewards have been sweet, the researcher said.
"We've always held it in our minds that this is going to help small farmers in some very poor places."
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