Bananas are curved in shape: Here is why

Bananas are easily the most recognisable of all fruits, especially because of their colour and shape. After all, you don't come across many fruits that look like crescent moons! But have you ever thought about why bananas are curved inward?  A process named negative geotropism is the responsible for it. 

Negative geotropism: What is it actually? 
As banana grows, the fruit starts to become heavy and begins sinking towards the ground. However, since fruits seek sunlight as they mature, the banana starts to curve upward in search of the sun’s rays. This is because bananas contain a chemical called auxin, a plant hormone that affects how the plant responds to sunlight.  

This creates a curved shape as the banana is effectively folding against itself in search of the sun. So, banana goes through a process called negative geotropism. Now you would want to know what that means. Geotropism is the growth of plants with respect to gravity. Since bananas turn towards the sun and away from gravity, the process is called negative geotropism.  

Origin of the fruit 
The fruit was domesticated in South Asia and New Guinea before the banana found its way to Europe in CE 300. By the 1800s, bananas had been selectively bred to be long and curvy, pretty much looking like the banana we eat today. 

More selective growing happened in the 1900s when banana plantations were incorporated into large cultivation and distributed all over by big distribution companies, which favoured the cultivation of bananas that looked and tasted alike and were genetically resistant to disease.  

Bananas: From flower to fruit 
Now, let us tell you about the banana’s journey from a flower to a fruit. Bananas start life as banana buds growing out of the strong, middle trunk of a banana tree (pseudostem). The buds grow to become flowers, which look like big, red cones hanging upside down on a long, knobby fleshy stalk. These cones are actually petals that enclose the banana fruits. The banana fruits initially look like slender, yellow flowers.  

Now, as the banana fruit grows, it elongates and changes its colour from bright yellow to green and the fruit starts taking the shape and form of young bananas. These young bananas are slender resembling rectangular fingers sticking out in rows from the stalk.  

So, can you find straight bananas?  
The curved variety of banana is the most common variant of this fruit. However, there are over 1000 varieties of bananas with different colours, sizes, and shapes.  In nature, organic bananas are often green or brown, short and chunky with very little to no curves in them.