Corn

Corn (Zea mays), also called maize, was first grown by Native Americans. It is used as a food, and for many other uses.

Because of its tightly-packed kernels, corn is incapable of reproducing without human aid. This is a result of microevolution.

It can be grown for both a cash crop and nourishment for people and livestock.

In the United States, there has recently been a boom in the use of corn to produce ethanol as automotive fuel. The result has been a rise in the price of corn, affecting its use for food and livestock feed.

However, it is questionable how ecologically sound this practise is. When you add together the natural gas in the fertilizer, the fossil fuels it takes to make the pesticides, power the tractor and other machinery needed to dry, harvest and transport corn, every bushel of field corn needs about a quarter to a third of a gallon to grow it, around fifty gallons per acre. It therefore takes more than a calorie of fossil fuel energy to produce a calorie of food. It is not clear how sustainable the growing of corn for biofuel would be.

Corn is a good subject for genetic studies. The offspring of a pair of gametes consists of the individual kernels on a single cob. These kernels may display easily observed phenotypic variation such as color. In an ear of corn with two colors of kernel, the number of kernels of each color will often display the classic 3:1 Mendelian ratio.

Field corn varieties are grown primarily for livestock feed. Varieties grown for human consumption contain a gene that increases the sugar content and are known as sweet corn.

In 1983, Barbara McClintock won the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for studies of the genetics of corn, specifically her 1948 discovery of mobile genetic elements in the corn genome.

Usage

The word maize always means the specific plant Zea mays. In the United States it much more commonly called "corn," as in corn-on-the-cob. In British usage, "corn" can mean any grain or kernel crop, specifically the staple crop of a particular region. It is important to understand this when reading English novels or studying English history (e.g. the Corn laws). In formal, academic, or scientific work that is written for an international audience it is common to use the word maize to avoid misunderstanding.

Maize is also the name for a color, an orange-yellow. According to a custom formalized in 1895, in university graduation ceremonies, graduates of a school of agriculture usually wear maize-colored tassels on their caps.

Corn in the Bible

Corn appears many times throughout the Holy Book:

Genesis 45:23 - And to his father he sent after this manner; ten asses laden with the good things of Egypt, and ten she asses laden with corn and bread and meat for his father by the way.

Genesis 47:14 - And Joseph gathered up all the money that was found in the land of Egypt, and in the land of Canaan, for the corn which they bought: and Joseph brought the money into Pharaoh's house.

Exodus 22:6 - If fire break out, and catch in thorns, so that the stacks of corn, or the standing corn, or the field, be consumed therewith; he that kindled the fire shall surely make restitution.

Chronicals II 31:5 - And as soon as the commandment came abroad, the children of Israel brought in abundance the firstfruits of corn, wine, and oil, and honey, and of all the increase of the field; and the tithe of all things brought they in abundantly.

Nehemiah 5:2 - For there were that said, We, our sons, and our daughters, are many: therefore we take up corn for them, that we may eat, and live.

Job 24:6 - They raped every one his corn in the field: and they gather the vintage of the wicked.

Job 24:24 - They are exalted for a little while, but are gone and brought low; they are taken out of the way as all other, and cut off as the tops of the ears of corn.