But even though date palms found in North Africa and the Middle East come from the same species, Phoenix dactylifera, researchers have found puzzling genetic differences between the date palms in the two regions. Genome analysis shows that North African date palms are a hybrid between Middle Eastern cultivated date palms and a wild species found in Southern Turkey and Crete. Five to 18 percent of the North African date palm genome comes from a wild variation that naturally grows in the Eastern Mediterranean, P. theophrasti. According to the researchers, this hybridization has increased the genetic diversity of North African date palms even though P. theophrasti produces inedible fruit. Future research could find ways to pair P. theophrasti date palms with other cultivated date palm species to breed for disease and drought resistance.

Source: The North Africa Journal January 17, 2019 06:56 UTC