Peppers & Citrus Fruits Codexery

Citrus

Genus of flowering trees producing many hybrid citrus fruits.

Last updated

Citrus

PierreSelim · CC BY 3.0

The fruit is a hesperidium, a specialized berry with a leathery rind and juicy inner segments.[1][2] World production of all citrus fruits in 2016 was 124 million tonnes, with about half being oranges.[3] The height of citrus plants ranges from 5 to 15 meters, they have spiny shoots, and their white flowers produce a strong scent.[4]

Scientific classification

  1. CladeTracheophytes
  2. CladeAngiosperms
  3. CladeEudicots
  4. CladeRosids
  5. OrderSapindales
  6. FamilyRutaceae
  7. GenusCitrus

Named by L.

Sources: Wikipedia taxobox: Citrus (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Quick Facts

Type species
Citrus medica

Facts from the source article.

Key facts and history

The genus Citrus evolved in the southeast foothills of the Himalayas, in a region stretching from eastern Assam to western Yunnan.[5][6] A climate change during the Late Miocene triggered a sudden speciation event that produced citrons, pomelos, mandarins, and other species.[7] The three ancestral species for modern cultivars are the mandarin orange, pomelo, and citron.[8] Almost all commercially important citrus fruits are hybrids between these three species.[8]

The citron was the first citrus to reach the Mediterranean, via overland and maritime trade routes.[9] Sweet oranges were brought to Europe by the Genoese and Portuguese during the 15th to 16th century.[10] Approximately 15 million years ago, the common ancestor of Citrus species began to split into different lineages.[11] During the 10th century CE, Arab traders were responsible for bringing lemons, pomelos, and sour oranges into the Mediterranean region.[10]

Spanish colonists were the ones who introduced oranges to Florida.[10] A publication from 2026 reported the first complete, haplotype-resolved genome assembly from telomere to telomere for Citrus maxima.[12][13]

What the cited sources add

The AGRUMED volume notes that the primary centers of citrus domestication are northeastern India and southwestern China.[14] The same source states that the first mention of a citrus fruit species was made by the Greek philosopher Theophrastus around 287 BC.[14] The "History of the Citrus and Citrus Tree Growing in America" records that Christopher Columbus introduced citrus on the island of Haiti in 1493.[15] That same source notes that the sweet orange appeared in the late 1400s, near the time of Columbus.[15]

References

  1. Wikipedia, "Citrus" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Ortiz, "Citrus: The Genus Citrus", Taylor & Francis, 2002, p. 16–35; Janick, Jules, "Citrus", Purdue University Tropical Horticulture Lecture 32, 2005 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  2. Wikipedia, "Citrus" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Ortiz, "Citrus: The Genus Citrus", Taylor & Francis, 2002, p. 16–35; "Citrus fruit diagram", ucla.edu (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  3. Wikipedia, "Citrus" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Citrus fruit, fresh and processed: Statistical Bulletin", UN Food and Agriculture Organization, 2016; "OEC — The Observer of Economic Complexity, Citrus", Oec.world; "OEC — The Observer of Economic Complexity, Fruit", Oec.world; "Citrus fruit, fresh and processed: Statistical Bulletin", UN Food and Agriculture Organization, 2016; "Citrus: World Markets and Trade", US Department of Agriculture, 1 January 2020 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  4. Wikipedia, "Citrus" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Del Hotal, "Citrus Pruning", California Rare Fruit Growers; Ortiz, "Citrus: The Genus Citrus", Taylor & Francis, 2002, p. 16–35 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  5. Wikipedia, "Citrus" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "A phylogenetic analysis of 34 chloroplast genomes elucidates the relationships between wild and domestic species within the genus Citrus", 31 January 2016; Briggs, "DNA Story of when life first gave us lemons", BBC News, 8 February 2018 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  6. Wikipedia, "Citrus" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Wu, "Genomics of the origin and evolution of Citrus", Nature, 2018, p. 311–316 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  7. Wikipedia, "Citrus" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Wu, "Genomics of the origin and evolution of Citrus", Nature, 2018, p. 311–316; Fuller, "AGRUMED: Archaeology and history of citrus fruit in the Mediterranean", Publications du Centre Jean Bérard, 2017, p. 29–48 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  8. Wikipedia, "Citrus" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Wu, "Genomics of the origin and evolution of Citrus", Nature, 2018, p. 311–316; Velasco, "A genealogy of the citrus family", Nature Biotechnology, 2014, p. 640–642; Inglese, "Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Environmental Science", 2019 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  9. Wikipedia, "Citrus" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Zech-Matterne, "AGRUMED: Archaeology and history of citrus fruit in the Mediterranean: Acclimatization, diversification, uses", Publications du Centre Jean Bérard, 2017; Langgut, "The Citrus Route Revealed: From Southeast Asia into the Mediterranean", HortScience, June 2017, p. 814–822; Langgut, "AGRUMED: Archaeology and history of citrus fruit in the Mediterranean", Publications du Centre Jean Bérard, 2017 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  10. Wikipedia, "Citrus" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Zech-Matterne, "AGRUMED: Archaeology and history of citrus fruit in the Mediterranean: Acclimatization, diversification, uses", Publications du Centre Jean Bérard, 2017; Langgut, "The Citrus Route Revealed: From Southeast Asia into the Mediterranean", HortScience, June 2017, p. 814–822; Langgut, "AGRUMED: Archaeology and history of citrus fruit in the Mediterranean", Publications du Centre Jean Bérard, 2017; "Exploring Florida Documents: Fruit", fcit.usf.edu; "History of the Citrus and Citrus Tree Growing in America", Tytyga.com; Britz, "Environ en.wikipedia.org
  11. Wikipedia, "Citrus" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Ollitrault, "The Citrus Genus", Elsevier, 2020, p. 57–81 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  12. Wikipedia, "Citrus" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Huang, "Haplotype-resolved telomere-to-telomere assembly and haplotype-aware annotation pipeline enable high-quality reannotation of three Citrus genomes", Horticulture Research, 2026-02-28; Alves, "Haplotype-resolved genome of Citrus × sinensis 'Pera IAC', the most widely cultivated sweet orange in Brazil", Scientific Data, 2026-04-14; Huang, "Haplotype-resolved telomere-to-telomere assembly and haplotype-aware annotation pipeline enable high-quality reannotation of three Citrus genomes", Horticulture Research, 2026-02-28; Alves, "Haplotype-res en.wikipedia.org
  13. Jing Huang, "Haplotype-resolved telomere-to-telomere assembly and haplotype-aware annotation pipeline enable high-quality reannotation of three Citrus genomes", Horticulture Research (2026), doi:10.1093/hr/uhag048. OpenAlex metadata CC0; paper not read. doi.org
  14. Zech-Matterne, "AGRUMED: Archaeology and history of citrus fruit in the Mediterranean: Acclimatization, diversification, uses", Publications du Centre Jean Bérard, 2017. facts only, no text reused. books.openedition.org
  15. "History of the Citrus and Citrus Tree Growing in America", Tytyga.com. facts only, no text reused. tytyga.com

Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Citrus (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.

More in Peppers & Citrus Fruits

Sources

Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.

Spotted an error? Know more?

Reader corrections go straight into our review queue. Suggest an edit · How this site is sourced

Comments

Loading…
Open in the interactive codex →