10 ms·

Kale, cauliflower, cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts are all the same species

99 points by lukas 12y ago

stygiansonic 12y ago
Great example of the power of selective breeding.
- mbreese 12y ago
  Ah yes, selective breeding... also known as the original method for creating GMOs. Nowadays we can just do things a bit faster without all of the waiting required for multiple generations of crops. But that doesn't mean that we haven't been practicing artificial genetic selection for millennia.
  - undersuit 12y ago
    Ah yes, validating all GMOs just because we've been breeding cultivars for thousands of years. Safety not gauranteed: The solanine heavy Lenape Potato, sure solanine is in all potatoes, but when did a non-green one make you sick? The "killer zucchini" from New Zealand with dangerous amounts of curcubitan caused by a aphid outbreak in the organic fields. Mono-cultures can happen: The Irish potato famine could have been reduced in severity if there were more variety among Ireland's food crops or their potato cultivars in 1845. While nowhere near as devasting to humanity, the destruction of the Gros Michel banana cultivar and the impending threat of the newest banana-phage on the current Cavendish cultivar aren't exactly a good faith offering on future mono-cultures, GMO or not, being avoided.
    - hibikir 12y ago
      You seem to be making two contradicting points here. On one end, you talk about food safety, and how altering the DNA of a plant means it might not be safe anymore. But in that case, the best thing we could do is to make sure we are always making plants with the exact same genetics: All clones. That's the only way you can tell what you are eating. There are more genetic changes in a naturally bred, not inbred crop than there are in a GMO event vs the untraited plant. Then you seem to dislike monocultures: If you want the plants to be safe from some phage, nothing better than high genetic diversity in plants, which leads to us really having no idea of how safe what we are eating is. We either want to treat them as drugs, and make monocultures the way of the world, or we look for genetic diversity, in which case having some BT toxins embedded in your corn plant won't be that bad. Just ask agribusiness to make sure there's at least 8 different germplasms per bag or something like that.
    - Houshalter 12y ago
      Genetic diversity issues are not really related. It is interesting that we can accidentally select for poisonous compounds. It turns out that plants can make themselves resistant to many pests; by filling themselves full of poison. These kind of issues are well known. See Conjuring An Evolution To Serve You http://lesswrong.com/lw/l8/conjuring_an_evolution_to_serve_you/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/l8/conjuring_an_evolution_to_serve_y...
  - pyre 12y ago
    Well, it's hard to selectively breed fish DNA into a plant... So there's always that. :P
    - Houshalter 12y ago
      It can happen by chance or convergent evolution. Mutation rates are sometimes artificially raised to increase the probability of it happening. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutation_breeding https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutation_breeding
      - dalke 12y ago
        It's extremely hard to selectively breed fish DNA into a plant. Convergent evolution doesn't end up with the same DNA sequence. My favorite example is the protease catalytic triad, where 20 or so different evolutionary routes have converged to the same chemical function, even though the DNA for those different superfamilies are different. The odds of mutation breeding producing a new gene (or more likely, changing an existing related gene to correct form) is incredibly small, and the result would be very expensive. Each generation would need to be sequenced, and the ones whose DNA is closer to the target re-bred. You want the mutation rates to be low enough that the rest of the plant isn't killed, so that's what, a mutation somewhere in the target gene every 1,000 generations? Assuming a short sequence of 100 base pairs, and perfect mutation gives 100,000 generations. Assuming a life cycle of 10 days means this will take over 2,500 years. I deliberately low-balled these numbers. So yes, "by chance" it's possible, in about the same way that a universe of monkeys could type out Hamlet.
        JoeAltmaier 12y ago
        Genes are swapped all the time. Its not just about mutation.
        dalke 12y ago
        The context is specifically "it's hard to selectively breed fish DNA into a plant." Houshalter proposed that mutation breeding was one way to do so. My back-of-the-envelope estimation was to show that it wasn't. What gene-swapped-based breeding technique can put a fish DNA sequence into a plant? I only know of genetic engineering techniques for that process.
jakespencer 12y ago
Though the article mentions it, I can't believe the headline left out broccoli, which is the form of this species that I eat the most of.
- dang 12y ago
  Let us rectify the insult to broccoli.
kolev 12y ago
Yes and they all are powerful goitrogenic plants. Don't eat them raw... unless you hate your thyroid! When I see people sipping on raw kale juice, I feel sorry for them! Raw is not always better! Would you eat raw potatoes, for example, or raw mushrooms (toxins), or spinach (rich in oxalates)?
- gohrt 12y ago
  Source? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goitrogen http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goitrogen makes the same claims, but has a long list of indicted veggies, with notably missing/broken sources. raw mushrooms and raw spinach are certainly popular...
- ejstronge 12y ago
  I just looked this up in the PubMed biomedical literature database and there aren't many studies that correlate the goitrogenic activity of cabbages, et al., to human thyroid activity. What's the impact of having kale juice once a day for a year? What if we simply consume extra iodine? Send links to papers if you have any primary references.
  - kolev 12y ago
    Well, a 16 oz bottle of juiced kale is a lot of kale! I've seen people having 2-3 of those a day. It's not precise science to know how much extra iodine to consume, I think. Raw kale is known for ages to make livestock sick. Either Dr. Fuhrman or Dr. Weil recommended that the best way to take full advantage of kale is to blend it, let it sit for 10 minutes, and then put it in a soup or another cooked meal.
    - rosser 12y ago
      Going by the argument that kale makes livestock sick, humans should never consume garlic, or chocolate, because they're poisonous to dogs and cats. Different animals have different metabolisms.
      - 12y ago
daveloyall 12y ago
I can't believe the author left THESE out: https://www.google.com/search?q=geometric+brassicas&tbm=isch https://www.google.com/search?q=geometric+brassicas&tbm=isch You can make them at home, but it requires a lot of work and luck, since brassicas cross-breed if they are near each other at all.
- technotony 12y ago
  Another plant he left out was Arabidopsis, which is the model organism most studied by plant biologists as it has the second shortest plant genome (they used to think it was the shortest). My company (http://www.glowingplant.com http://www.glowingplant.com) is engineering these to make them glow in the dark... so maybe we can make glow-in-the-dark broccoli next ;) It's not hundreds of years to make new cultivars now, dramatic changes can be achieved in months. Fun fact: you can make an arabidopsis look like a Brussels sprout with the modification to a single gene... it wouldn't taste as good though, that takes more genes!
  - jarin 12y ago
    That's probably because it's not even in the same genus as the others.
- riffraff 12y ago
  FWIW, this is the default broccoli in center italy (hence the name "romanesco"[0]). Took me decades to understand why american media used such weird broccoli (i.e. what the rest of the world call thus). [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanesco_broccoli http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanesco_broccoli
- ajb 12y ago
  I've always wondered if those are the ones in the famous Diocletian quote "Would you could see the cabbages planted by my hand at Salona, you would then never think of urging such an attempt [to return from retirement as Emperor]".
- contingencies 12y ago
  In Chinese these are called 塔菜 (ta cai) or "tower vegetable".
daveslash 12y ago
I don't believe it. Very interesting read, and I don't doubt that the plants all originated from the same species . However, I'm not convinced that they are still the same species; can one assert that we have, through artificial selection, induced speciation? I believe this is more likely. I will admit that the definition of "species" is subject to debate. The general definition to which I subscribe requires that two individuals are able to mate, produce offspring, and that can then mate and produce offspring of its own. A major shortcoming with this definition, however, is that it does not address Ring Species. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_species http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_species
- conwayanderson 12y ago
  Using your own definition for species, you're supporting the claim that they are all the same species. They have produced "offspring."
  - daveslash 12y ago
    Can you cross pollinate cauliflower and broccoli (outside of genetic engineering)? I honestly cannot say with certainty, but I tend to doubt it. If you can, I would think same species; if you can't, I'd think separate. My supporting evidence is non-scientific and anecdotal - having a garden for 15 years with both plants in close proximity I would have thought if cross pollination had been possible it would have happened in that time frame.
    - Shog9 12y ago
      Yes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broccoflower http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broccoflower Google is your friend. FWIW, an awful lot of seed growing involves preventing unwanted crosses, but unless you were saving seeds from your garden you might overlook this.
      - daveslash 12y ago
        Thank you. From the wiki page, I can't tell if that's Broccoflower is the result of cross-pollination as would happen naturally or the result of direct human intervention - I also can't tell if the seeds from Broccoflower are viable - I'll Google around more and learn :-) As for overlooking - you're right, I did and should have thought of that before commenting. After a few attempts at saving seeds it became obvious to me that buying them each season was preferable.
31reasons 12y ago
Whatever you want to call it, they don't have exactly the same genome. Calling them the same species is like saying Dog is Wolf and Human is Ape.
- undersuit 12y ago
  You and I don't have the same genome, we aren't the same species?
- splawn 12y ago
  Unless you are my long lost twin, you and I don't have the exact same genome either. Personally, I like the thought that cauliflower is the poodle of cabbages.
- sp332 12y ago
  I'm not sure if it has changed, but things used to be called the same species if they can interbreed with each other and produce fertile offspring. Dog is wolf, yes; man is ape, no.
  - MikeTaylor 12y ago
    What you are describing is known as the Biological Species Concept. It's one of at least 28 species concepts that have been proposed in the scientific literature -- they were surveyed in a review paper whose reference irritatingly escapes me. Anyway, the BSC is not the only game in town (and is particularly useless to those, like me, who are palaeontologists.)
  - kennywinker 12y ago
    Some scientists theorize that that a Humanzee is possible http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanzee http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanzee
  - 31reasons 12y ago
    Selective pressure to modify the genome is the goal for altering organism's characteristics not unlike what happens naturally. So it is indirect gene editing. Now if the new organism is still the same species as you started with. I am not sure about that. There must be a test/definition for that. I think man descended from Ape and is homosapien.
mmanfrin 12y ago
As is mustard. It's a pretty astounding species.
- aamar 12y ago
  The mustard that we typically eat as a condiment or greens are Sinapis alba, Brassica juncea, and Brassica nigra, which are in the same family as Brassica oleracea, but they aren't the same species.
OmarIsmail 12y ago
I've unintentionally known this for about 25 years. Nobody ever believed that I was allergic to broccoli or cauliflower and just thought I hated them. Then one day I tried out kale and found that it tasted similar to broccoli to me. I asked my wife if she felt the same way (brussel sprouts also taste the same) and she said they all taste very different to her. We then looked up and saw that they're all part of the mustard family. So if you're ever curious if a plant is part of the mustard family just let me taste it and I'll let you know... and then throw up on you.
- taejo 12y ago
  If you taste them raw, they all definitely have a common, slightly mustardy flavour.
BrainInAJar 12y ago
what is this? /r/TIL ? Of course they are...
- OedipusRex 12y ago
  This is HackerNews. Hacker. News. I believe we should be focusing on other types of food that are related like pickles and cucumbers.
- mcphage 12y ago
  There's a number of people who visit Hacker News and not Reddit... and since HN doesn't have subreddits, they just dump whatever thing they find is interesting in the same place, regardless of how appropriate it is to the site's purpose. It's obnoxious.
- acheron 12y ago
  Seriously. I try to not get overly annoyed at people finding out common facts: everyone has to learn it once, right? But this is an awfully obvious one. Besides, there's really no justification for linking to Ezra and Matty's Mouth-Breathers-r-Us.
- mdturnerphys 12y ago
  http://xkcd.com/1053/ http://xkcd.com/1053/
  - BrainInAJar 12y ago
    Yeah, I understand people learn new things all the time, but is HN a really appropriate place for Facebook posts?
Pirate-of-SV 12y ago
In Swedish and I guess in other languages as well it's not that mind blowing. We call them: Grönkål, Blomkål, Vitkål, Broccoli, Brysselkål
- bonchibuji 12y ago
  Here are the Finnish names (in the order of the headline): lehtikaali, kukkakaali, kaali, parsakaali, ruusukaalikasveille
contingencies 12y ago
As it happens I learned this last week or so creating my latest Wikipedia trivia page, the ultimately badass http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_superfoods http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_superfoods

99 points by lukas 12y ago

stygiansonic 12y ago

Great example of the power of selective breeding.

mbreese 12y ago
Ah yes, selective breeding... also known as the original method for creating GMOs. Nowadays we can just do things a bit faster without all of the waiting required for multiple generations of crops. But that doesn't mean that we haven't been practicing artificial genetic selection for millennia.
- undersuit 12y ago
  Ah yes, validating all GMOs just because we've been breeding cultivars for thousands of years. Safety not gauranteed: The solanine heavy Lenape Potato, sure solanine is in all potatoes, but when did a non-green one make you sick? The "killer zucchini" from New Zealand with dangerous amounts of curcubitan caused by a aphid outbreak in the organic fields. Mono-cultures can happen: The Irish potato famine could have been reduced in severity if there were more variety among Ireland's food crops or their potato cultivars in 1845. While nowhere near as devasting to humanity, the destruction of the Gros Michel banana cultivar and the impending threat of the newest banana-phage on the current Cavendish cultivar aren't exactly a good faith offering on future mono-cultures, GMO or not, being avoided.
  - hibikir 12y ago
    You seem to be making two contradicting points here. On one end, you talk about food safety, and how altering the DNA of a plant means it might not be safe anymore. But in that case, the best thing we could do is to make sure we are always making plants with the exact same genetics: All clones. That's the only way you can tell what you are eating. There are more genetic changes in a naturally bred, not inbred crop than there are in a GMO event vs the untraited plant. Then you seem to dislike monocultures: If you want the plants to be safe from some phage, nothing better than high genetic diversity in plants, which leads to us really having no idea of how safe what we are eating is. We either want to treat them as drugs, and make monocultures the way of the world, or we look for genetic diversity, in which case having some BT toxins embedded in your corn plant won't be that bad. Just ask agribusiness to make sure there's at least 8 different germplasms per bag or something like that.
  - Houshalter 12y ago
    Genetic diversity issues are not really related. It is interesting that we can accidentally select for poisonous compounds. It turns out that plants can make themselves resistant to many pests; by filling themselves full of poison. These kind of issues are well known. See Conjuring An Evolution To Serve You http://lesswrong.com/lw/l8/conjuring_an_evolution_to_serve_you/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/l8/conjuring_an_evolution_to_serve_y...
- pyre 12y ago
  Well, it's hard to selectively breed fish DNA into a plant... So there's always that. :P
  - Houshalter 12y ago
    It can happen by chance or convergent evolution. Mutation rates are sometimes artificially raised to increase the probability of it happening. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutation_breeding https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutation_breeding
    - dalke 12y ago
      It's extremely hard to selectively breed fish DNA into a plant. Convergent evolution doesn't end up with the same DNA sequence. My favorite example is the protease catalytic triad, where 20 or so different evolutionary routes have converged to the same chemical function, even though the DNA for those different superfamilies are different. The odds of mutation breeding producing a new gene (or more likely, changing an existing related gene to correct form) is incredibly small, and the result would be very expensive. Each generation would need to be sequenced, and the ones whose DNA is closer to the target re-bred. You want the mutation rates to be low enough that the rest of the plant isn't killed, so that's what, a mutation somewhere in the target gene every 1,000 generations? Assuming a short sequence of 100 base pairs, and perfect mutation gives 100,000 generations. Assuming a life cycle of 10 days means this will take over 2,500 years. I deliberately low-balled these numbers. So yes, "by chance" it's possible, in about the same way that a universe of monkeys could type out Hamlet.
      - JoeAltmaier 12y ago
        Genes are swapped all the time. Its not just about mutation.
        dalke 12y ago
        The context is specifically "it's hard to selectively breed fish DNA into a plant." Houshalter proposed that mutation breeding was one way to do so. My back-of-the-envelope estimation was to show that it wasn't. What gene-swapped-based breeding technique can put a fish DNA sequence into a plant? I only know of genetic engineering techniques for that process.

jakespencer 12y ago

Though the article mentions it, I can't believe the headline left out broccoli, which is the form of this species that I eat the most of.

dang 12y ago
Let us rectify the insult to broccoli.

kolev 12y ago

Yes and they all are powerful goitrogenic plants. Don't eat them raw... unless you hate your thyroid! When I see people sipping on raw kale juice, I feel sorry for them! Raw is not always better! Would you eat raw potatoes, for example, or raw mushrooms (toxins), or spinach (rich in oxalates)?

gohrt 12y ago
Source? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goitrogen http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goitrogen makes the same claims, but has a long list of indicted veggies, with notably missing/broken sources. raw mushrooms and raw spinach are certainly popular...
ejstronge 12y ago
I just looked this up in the PubMed biomedical literature database and there aren't many studies that correlate the goitrogenic activity of cabbages, et al., to human thyroid activity. What's the impact of having kale juice once a day for a year? What if we simply consume extra iodine? Send links to papers if you have any primary references.
- kolev 12y ago
  Well, a 16 oz bottle of juiced kale is a lot of kale! I've seen people having 2-3 of those a day. It's not precise science to know how much extra iodine to consume, I think. Raw kale is known for ages to make livestock sick. Either Dr. Fuhrman or Dr. Weil recommended that the best way to take full advantage of kale is to blend it, let it sit for 10 minutes, and then put it in a soup or another cooked meal.
  - rosser 12y ago
    Going by the argument that kale makes livestock sick, humans should never consume garlic, or chocolate, because they're poisonous to dogs and cats. Different animals have different metabolisms.
    - 12y ago

daveloyall 12y ago

I can't believe the author left THESE out: https://www.google.com/search?q=geometric+brassicas&tbm=isch https://www.google.com/search?q=geometric+brassicas&tbm=isch You can make them at home, but it requires a lot of work and luck, since brassicas cross-breed if they are near each other at all.

technotony 12y ago
Another plant he left out was Arabidopsis, which is the model organism most studied by plant biologists as it has the second shortest plant genome (they used to think it was the shortest). My company (http://www.glowingplant.com http://www.glowingplant.com) is engineering these to make them glow in the dark... so maybe we can make glow-in-the-dark broccoli next ;) It's not hundreds of years to make new cultivars now, dramatic changes can be achieved in months. Fun fact: you can make an arabidopsis look like a Brussels sprout with the modification to a single gene... it wouldn't taste as good though, that takes more genes!
- jarin 12y ago
  That's probably because it's not even in the same genus as the others.
riffraff 12y ago
FWIW, this is the default broccoli in center italy (hence the name "romanesco"[0]). Took me decades to understand why american media used such weird broccoli (i.e. what the rest of the world call thus). [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanesco_broccoli http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanesco_broccoli
ajb 12y ago
I've always wondered if those are the ones in the famous Diocletian quote "Would you could see the cabbages planted by my hand at Salona, you would then never think of urging such an attempt [to return from retirement as Emperor]".
contingencies 12y ago
In Chinese these are called 塔菜 (ta cai) or "tower vegetable".

daveslash 12y ago

I don't believe it. Very interesting read, and I don't doubt that the plants all originated from the same species . However, I'm not convinced that they are still the same species; can one assert that we have, through artificial selection, induced speciation? I believe this is more likely. I will admit that the definition of "species" is subject to debate. The general definition to which I subscribe requires that two individuals are able to mate, produce offspring, and that can then mate and produce offspring of its own. A major shortcoming with this definition, however, is that it does not address Ring Species. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_species http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_species

conwayanderson 12y ago
Using your own definition for species, you're supporting the claim that they are all the same species. They have produced "offspring."
- daveslash 12y ago
  Can you cross pollinate cauliflower and broccoli (outside of genetic engineering)? I honestly cannot say with certainty, but I tend to doubt it. If you can, I would think same species; if you can't, I'd think separate. My supporting evidence is non-scientific and anecdotal - having a garden for 15 years with both plants in close proximity I would have thought if cross pollination had been possible it would have happened in that time frame.
  - Shog9 12y ago
    Yes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broccoflower http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broccoflower Google is your friend. FWIW, an awful lot of seed growing involves preventing unwanted crosses, but unless you were saving seeds from your garden you might overlook this.
    - daveslash 12y ago
      Thank you. From the wiki page, I can't tell if that's Broccoflower is the result of cross-pollination as would happen naturally or the result of direct human intervention - I also can't tell if the seeds from Broccoflower are viable - I'll Google around more and learn :-) As for overlooking - you're right, I did and should have thought of that before commenting. After a few attempts at saving seeds it became obvious to me that buying them each season was preferable.

31reasons 12y ago

Whatever you want to call it, they don't have exactly the same genome. Calling them the same species is like saying Dog is Wolf and Human is Ape.

undersuit 12y ago
You and I don't have the same genome, we aren't the same species?
splawn 12y ago
Unless you are my long lost twin, you and I don't have the exact same genome either. Personally, I like the thought that cauliflower is the poodle of cabbages.
sp332 12y ago
I'm not sure if it has changed, but things used to be called the same species if they can interbreed with each other and produce fertile offspring. Dog is wolf, yes; man is ape, no.
- MikeTaylor 12y ago
  What you are describing is known as the Biological Species Concept. It's one of at least 28 species concepts that have been proposed in the scientific literature -- they were surveyed in a review paper whose reference irritatingly escapes me. Anyway, the BSC is not the only game in town (and is particularly useless to those, like me, who are palaeontologists.)
- kennywinker 12y ago
  Some scientists theorize that that a Humanzee is possible http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanzee http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanzee
- 31reasons 12y ago
  Selective pressure to modify the genome is the goal for altering organism's characteristics not unlike what happens naturally. So it is indirect gene editing. Now if the new organism is still the same species as you started with. I am not sure about that. There must be a test/definition for that. I think man descended from Ape and is homosapien.

mmanfrin 12y ago

As is mustard. It's a pretty astounding species.

aamar 12y ago
The mustard that we typically eat as a condiment or greens are Sinapis alba, Brassica juncea, and Brassica nigra, which are in the same family as Brassica oleracea, but they aren't the same species.

OmarIsmail 12y ago

I've unintentionally known this for about 25 years. Nobody ever believed that I was allergic to broccoli or cauliflower and just thought I hated them. Then one day I tried out kale and found that it tasted similar to broccoli to me. I asked my wife if she felt the same way (brussel sprouts also taste the same) and she said they all taste very different to her. We then looked up and saw that they're all part of the mustard family. So if you're ever curious if a plant is part of the mustard family just let me taste it and I'll let you know... and then throw up on you.

taejo 12y ago
If you taste them raw, they all definitely have a common, slightly mustardy flavour.

BrainInAJar 12y ago

what is this? /r/TIL ? Of course they are...

OedipusRex 12y ago
This is HackerNews. Hacker. News. I believe we should be focusing on other types of food that are related like pickles and cucumbers.
mcphage 12y ago
There's a number of people who visit Hacker News and not Reddit... and since HN doesn't have subreddits, they just dump whatever thing they find is interesting in the same place, regardless of how appropriate it is to the site's purpose. It's obnoxious.
acheron 12y ago
Seriously. I try to not get overly annoyed at people finding out common facts: everyone has to learn it once, right? But this is an awfully obvious one. Besides, there's really no justification for linking to Ezra and Matty's Mouth-Breathers-r-Us.
mdturnerphys 12y ago
http://xkcd.com/1053/ http://xkcd.com/1053/
- BrainInAJar 12y ago
  Yeah, I understand people learn new things all the time, but is HN a really appropriate place for Facebook posts?

Pirate-of-SV 12y ago

In Swedish and I guess in other languages as well it's not that mind blowing. We call them: Grönkål, Blomkål, Vitkål, Broccoli, Brysselkål

bonchibuji 12y ago
Here are the Finnish names (in the order of the headline): lehtikaali, kukkakaali, kaali, parsakaali, ruusukaalikasveille

contingencies 12y ago

As it happens I learned this last week or so creating my latest Wikipedia trivia page, the ultimately badass http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_superfoods http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_superfoods