Today in Nature: We are all children of the corn

September 20th: I was in the country today to celebrate my Aunt and Uncle's 60th wedding anniversary. When they got married, corn was just starting to become one of North America's big crops. Scientists had figured out how to take this South American plant and change it so that it could endure being crowded together to increase crop yields. Next, they made the kernels infertile, so each year, farmers have to buy new seed. When my Aunt and Uncle got married, corn was something you ate, when you ate, well, corn. Now it is used to make 1/4 of all the stuff you can buy in the supermarket - it is in soda pop, most cereals, processed foods, and even in the plastic packaging. So if we are what we eat, we are all now children of the corn.