''Fragaria iturupensis'', the Iturup strawberry, is a species of wild strawberry,

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

to Iturup in the

Kuril Islands The Kuril Islands or Kurile Islands are a volcanic archipelago administered as part of Sakhalin Oblast in the Russian Far East. The islands stretch approximately northeast from Hokkaido in Japan to Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia, separating the ...

. It is noted to have relatively large berries for a wild species, similar in appearance to those of '' Fragaria virginiana''.

Polyploidy

All strawberries have a base

haploid Ploidy () is the number of complete sets of chromosomes in a cell (biology), cell, and hence the number of possible alleles for Autosome, autosomal and Pseudoautosomal region, pseudoautosomal genes. Here ''sets of chromosomes'' refers to the num ...

count of 7

chromosomes A chromosome is a package of DNA containing part or all of the genetic material of an organism. In most chromosomes, the very long thin DNA fibers are coated with nucleosome-forming packaging proteins; in eukaryotic cells, the most importa ...

. ''Fragaria iturupensis'' was initially reported as

octoploid Polyploidy is a condition in which the cells of an organism have more than two paired sets of ( homologous) chromosomes. Most species whose cells have nuclei (eukaryotes) are diploid, meaning they have two complete sets of chromosomes, one fro ...

(with 8 sets of chromosomes, 56 in total), but subsequent testingHummer, K.E.; Nathewet, P.; Yanagi, T. (2009). Decaploidy in ''Fragaria iturupensis'' (Rosaceae). ''American Journal of Botany''. 96(3): 713–716. found decaploids (with ten sets of chromosomes, a total of 70). It is unclear whether the earlier report was an error, or whether two forms exist.

References

External links

*Hummer, K.E., Sabitov, A., & Davis, T. 2005. Iturup And Sakhalin Island Strawberries. ''HortScience'' 40(4): 1127
Abstract
iturupensis Flora of the Kuril Islands Iturup {{fruit-stub