Q 01/05

A compound made from wild Mexican yams by chemist Russell Marker paved the way for which landmark medicine?

A) The first polio vaccine

B) Synthetic human insulin

C) The contraceptive pill

D) The antibiotic penicillin

Answer · why

C) The contraceptive pill

The contraceptive pill grew out of the cheap progesterone Marker learned to make from yam roots, founding a steroid industry in Mexico. He had earlier...

Q 02/05

Cultivated sweet potatoes are a natural GMO, carrying genes picked up long ago from which kind of organism?

A) Bacteria

B) Fungi

C) Viruses

D) Nematodes

Answer · why

A) Bacteria

Bacteria of the Agrobacterium group inserted their DNA into an ancestor of the crop, and the genes still work today. That makes sweet potato the first...

Q 03/05

Sweet potatoes are only distant cousins of ordinary potatoes and belong to which flowering plant family?

A) Nightshade

B) Morning glory

C) Evening primrose

D) Buttercup

Answer · why

B) Morning glory

Morning glory is the family, and sweet potato is its only major food crop. The ordinary potato sits with tomatoes among the nightshades, and true yams...

Q 04/05

Candied yams, the sweet potato side dish of American Thanksgiving, are often baked under which topping?

A) Whipped cream

B) Meringue

C) Cream cheese

D) Marshmallows

Answer · why

D) Marshmallows

Marshmallows melt over a dish that contains no yams at all. The name is a misnomer, because true yams became rare in American kitchens after colonial ...

Q 05/05

Which West African country grows about two-thirds of all the true yams harvested in the world?

A) Nigeria

B) Ghana

C) Cameroon

D) Senegal

Answer · why

A) Nigeria

Nigeria harvested 67% of the world's yams in 2020. The crop is so prized in the region that many communities hold a festival before anyone may eat the...