Durum wheat with a total production of about 35 million tons is the 10th most important crops worldwide. It is an integral component of the Mediterranean diet and one of the historical foods that followed the birth of civilization, likely to be one of the first domesticated crops in the Fertile Crescent. Durum is a tetraploid wheat with a genome of about 12 Gb, domesticated from wild emmer in the Fertile Crescent about 10,000 years ago. Further, it is an integral component of the Mediterranean diet and it is the historical food that followed the birth of civilization in the Fertile Crescent. From here it expanded to Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Americas, and it is today cultivated across the globe. The domestication process and the subsequent breeding activity have selected the modern durum wheat fixing the typical domestication traits (e.g. brittle rachis, naked seeds and threshability), agronomic traits (e.g. short straw and disease resistances) as well as specific pasta quality traits (grain hardness, pigment content, protein content).[1]

Taxonomy ID 4567

Data source CNR (National Research Council) Italy

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