6 articles
Blue corn
Blue corn, blue maize, varieties of Zea mays with blue kernels from anthocyanins in the aleurone layer; grown by Hopi and Mexican landrace farmers, nixtamalized into tortillas, higher protein and antioxidants than white or yellow corn.
Dent corn
Dent corn, a class of Zea mays field corn, has hard side endosperm and a soft floury crown that dents on drying. Descended from northern flint crossed with southern dent, it dominates U.S. Corn Belt production for feed and ethanol.
Detasseling
Detasseling removes the tassel from female maize plants in hybrid seed corn fields to prevent self-pollination; done by hand or machine, with male sterility systems like CMS and Ms44-SPT as alternatives, costing about 14% seed yield when manual.
Flint corn
Flint corn (Zea mays indurate), also called Indian corn, is hard-vitreous-endosperm maize with convex kernels; popcorn is a flint type. Lower yielding than dent corn but higher in protein and digestible amino acids, it dominates Brazilian and high-latitude production.
Popcorn
Popcorn (Zea mays everta) is a flint-type maize whose thick pericarp lets steam pressure reach about 135 psi before rupture at ~180 °C, popping kernels 30–40-fold; distinct from dent, sweet, and flint corn.
Sugarcane
Sugarcane (Saccharum spp.) is a tropical grass, domesticated in New Guinea, supplying about 80 percent of the world's sugar and a major feedstock for bioethanol.