Apple - a Genome Winner

Apple - the fruit - is considered one the world's healthiest foods.  It is cultivated worldwide, having originated in Central Asia.  Its wild ancestor, Malus sieversii is still found there today.  Consider that apples have been grown for thousands of years in Asia and Europe, and came to North America by European colonists. Golden Delicious was used to sequence the complete genome of the apple - there are about 57,000 genes, the highest number of any plant genome studied to date. It has more genes than a human (about 30,000).   This from Wikipedia:  The center of diversity of the genus Malus is in eastern present-day Turkey. The apple tree was perhaps the earliest tree to be cultivated,and its fruits have been improved through selection over thousands of years. Alexander the Great is credited with finding dwarfed apples in Kazakhstan in 328 BCE. Winter apples, picked in late autumn and stored just above freezing, have been an important food in Asia and Europe for millennia. Of the many Old World plants that the Spanish introduced to Chiloé Archipelago in the 16th century, apple trees became particularly well adapted. Apples were introduced to North America by colonists in the 17th century, and the first apple orchard on the North American continent was planted in Boston by Reverend William Blaxton in 1625. The only apples native to North America are crab apples, which were once called "common apples". Apple cultivars brought as seed from Europe were spread along Native American trade routes, as well as being cultivated on colonial farms. An 1845 United States apples nursery catalogue sold 350 of the "best" cultivars, showing the proliferation of new North American cultivars by the early 19th century. Today there are considered to be 2,500 varieties of apples grown in the U.S. There are 7,500 varieties grown throughout the world. It is market day in Grimsby, and perhaps I'll see the beloved Honey Crisp Apple available.  This picture shows Grimsby farm Silmaril on the escarpment a few years ago.  It has a distinctive combination - chickens, apples, and labrador retrievers.