Why do some people say that sweet corn, cherry tomatoes and colored peppers are genetically modified foods?

Speaking of sweet corn, I believe my friends are no strangers. Whether at the school gate or at the intersection of the vegetable market, there are always vendors pushing steaming boiled corn to sell, and the sweetness of corn floating in the wind can be smelled across the street. Passers-by who couldn't resist the temptation leaned in and said, give me two sweet corn.

However, with the intensification of food safety incidents in recent years, people's vigilance against food safety is also increasing. In particular, the rejection of genetically modified foods is no less than that of rats crossing the street. Sweet corn is just a variety of corn, also called vegetable corn. It is the product of artificial breeding hybridization, but it is not a genetically modified product. Different varieties of corn have different tastes. Biologically speaking, corn kernels can be divided into seed coat, endosperm and embryo, and the key factor to make corn sweet lies in the endosperm of corn.

During the ripening of corn, glucose is produced through photosynthesis, which is transported to the endosperm and stored in the form of starch. But starch itself is not sweet. The common corn we eat is not sweet, which is the reason. The difference of sweet corn is that its endosperm not only contains starch, but also contains relatively high content of water-soluble polysaccharides, which makes it different from ordinary corn in sweetness.

Moreover, sweet corn is not a genetically modified variety, and the cherry tomatoes, purple potatoes and colored peppers currently sold in China's market are not genetically modified varieties. Plants are precious wealth endowed by nature. Humans have cultivated and domesticated wild plants in the long-term farming practice, thus forming a rich crop type. All sweet corn, cherry tomatoes, purple sweet potatoes and colored peppers in China market are varieties produced by natural evolution and artificial selection.

In fact, sweet corn is not only a non-GMO food, but also its nutritional value is much higher than that of ordinary corn. Sweet corn not only contains vitamins, minerals, linoleic acid and other elements contained in ordinary corn, but also contains a lot of magnesium, which can strengthen the peristalsis of intestinal wall and promote the excretion of waste in the body. In addition, corn is rich in plant cellulose, which has the characteristics of stimulating gastrointestinal peristalsis and accelerating fecal excretion, and can prevent constipation, enteritis and intestinal cancer.

Especially for office workers who often use their eyes, eating corn often is good for their eyes! In order to alleviate macular degeneration and vision loss, lutein and zeaxanthin can absorb harmful light entering the eyeball by their powerful antioxidant effects.