The Bitter End

摘要

Though it looks like any ordinary watermelon—and smells deliciously sweet—this mutant is no picnic treat. Its juicy red fruit is overwhelmingly bitter. Even a small nibble provokes an intense gagging reflex and imparts an aftertaste that lingers for close to an hour—unless you're an adult corn root-worm, also known as a cucumber beetle. The juice of this mutant melon "tastes like a hot-fudge sundae to rootworms," explains Albert DeMilo, a chemist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Beltsville (Md.) Agricultural Research Center (BARC).