Potatoes from tomatoes? Popular starchy vegetable derived from ancient interbreeding, researchers say

science • 7/31/2025

The origin of potatoes has puzzled scientists for years, but researchers now say they've found an unlikely ancestor: tomatoes.

Meet the potato's unexpected ancestor: the tomato. That's right, a fruit. Potatoes and tomatoes don't look alike, smell alike or taste alike, but in a study published Thursday in the journal Cell, scientists said that the potato evolved from a tomato... [1883 chars]