The Genetic Diversity of Bananas Has Been Cataloged

A new research paper presents a cutting-edge catalog of banana diversity, utilizing innovative genomic techniques to trace the ancestral origins of various banana cultivars. The study involved collaboration between multiple institutions and includes a comprehensive catalog of cultivated bananas.

We are living in an incredible time of advances in genomics. Technology is revolutionizing how we understand the natural world. With the decreasing cost of genomic sequencing, researchers can now study larger numbers of plants and reimagine how we represent plant diversity. This allows for a more comprehensive approach, combining traditional visual classifications based on physical characteristics with an additional layer of diversity derived from genetic data.

Recent advancements in our understanding of the cultivated banana genome have led to the development of an innovative technique called in silico chromosome painting. This computer-based method traces the ancestral origins of the chromosomes in cultivated banana varieties. The technique was applied to many accessions from the international genebank, as well as newly collected material from Southeast Asia and the Pacific.

This collaborative study was conducted by researchers from the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT, CIRAD (France), USDA–ARS Tropical Agriculture Research Station (Puerto Rico, USA), NARI (Papua New Guinea), and the Ministries of Agriculture from the Cook Islands and Samoa, and was recently published in the journal Plants, People, Planet, providing new insights into banana diversity.

The result is a series of colorful, mosaic-like image representations of chromosomes that can be regarded as the genomic signatures of the many distinct cultivar groups of bananas, such as the well-known Cavendish or plantain. This effort also led to the discovery that some locally appreciated banana groups such as Pisang Awak or Maia Maoli Popoulu were not made of a single clone, opening interesting perspectives for the diversification of a crop that is often cultivated in monoclonal fields. 

Although mosaics are obtained by automated bioinformatic procedures, Alberto Cenci - co-first author of the study - reflects on the analyses behind this achievement: