Why do strawberries smell bad

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Simon Cotton does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment. Each year, spectators at the Wimbledon tennis tournament get through a whopping 30 tons of strawberries in the course of a summer fortnight. It is no wonder that the association between Wimbledon and strawberries is such a marketing triumph.

But why do we fall for it? Scientists have actually worked out what it is we love so much about strawberries by pinning down the molecular basis of the its aroma. This can also explain why wild strawberries often taste better than shop-bought ones. The good news is that the work is helping them uncover how to make them even more delicious. Strawberries have a long and proud history — even the ancient Romans ate them. We know this from the works of poets Virgil and Ovid , which referred to them as fraga.

Some years ago, the wood strawberry , Fragaria vesca , was around in Europe and the musk strawberry, Fragaria moschata , was starting to be cultivated. These were what we would recognise today as wild strawberries, characterised by small, misshapen fruit.

The most common type of strawberries we eat today came to us by coincidence via the transatlantic explorations of Christopher Columbus and his successors. First the very hardy Virginia strawberry Fragaria Virginiana , a native of North America, reached Europe in the 17th century.

Then early in the 18th century, the large Chilean strawberry Fragaria Chiloensis came to France. This combined in one fruit two particular traits inherited from its forerunners: hardiness and large fruit. When I was young — in the s — you only saw strawberries in the shops for a couple of weeks of the summer, roughly coinciding with Wimbledon. Now we have them all the year round. With this process understood, scientists could one day make more realistic tasting food.

Results are published in The Journal of Biological Chemistry. We are excited to announce that FibromyalgiaTreating. All of the same great people, writers and editors but now with more firepower. We now have access to an enormous amount of additional research information from doctors and scientists. We can now extend to other conditions that may be part of your everyday lives and help you on a broad level if that is what you need.