An Oregon scientist with a lot of extra time on his hands has set out to bring a Simpsons episode to life — and succeeded.

He’s created “tomacco,” a bizarre cross between tobacco and tomatoes, after watching an episode in which Homer Simpson creates the addictive crop.

In the episode, Homer grows the hybrid by accident when he mixes the plants’ seeds together. The plant bears strange fruit that has a brown, gooey centre and that Homer’s son Bart declares taste “like cigarette butts.”

Yet Bart can’t resist eating more and soon decides the fruit are “smooth and mild — and refreshingly addictive!” The entire town becomes hooked after one bite, and Homer gets rich.

Rob Baur of Lake Oswego, Oregon, wondered whether such a thing could exist. He tried grafting a tobacco plant onto a tomato root. But it didn’t take, and the plant died.

He then tried reversing it, grafting a tomato plant onto tobacco roots. After a few trials and errors, he ended up with a “tomacco” plant. Thankfully, it didn’t require the boost of plutonium “fertilizer” that Homer’s crops needed.

Baur’s plant is small and has produced only one piece of fruit. But a laboratory has confirmed the plant’s leaves indeed contain nicotine. Though the fruit hasn’t been tested, Baur believes it could be poisonous since it likely contains a lethal amount of nicotine.

The tomato and tobacco plant can successfully become one because they come from the same plant family, which also includes eggplant and the deadly nightshade.

Bauer, an operations analyst in an Oregon waste-water facility, remembered a 1959 study he had read for a graduate chemistry class in university, in which researchers crossed a tomato plant with tobacco. Since his work involves chemistry, he had saved his textbooks and was able to find the 1959 study.

It turns out that George Meyers, a writer for The Simpsons at the time, got a degree in biochemistry from Harvard. However, he didn’t write the tomacco episode. It was written by Ian Maxtone-Graham, who majored in English at Brown University.

The local Oregon affiliate for Fox News, the sister network of Fox, which creates The Simpsons, has done a segment on Baur’s accomplishment. Now he’s an instant celebrity.

And yet, no tobacco companies have called demanding the rights, the fate that befell Homer. But Baur is relieved. At least the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives hasn’t called.

source : http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20031113/tomacco031113?s_name=&no_ads=