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Potato
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Perennial plant with edible tuberous roots that are rich in starch and are extensively eaten as a vegetable. Used by the Andean Indians for at least 2,000 years before the Spanish Conquest, the potato was introduced to Europe by the mid-16th century, and reputedly to England by the explorer Walter Raleigh. (Genus Solanum tuberosum, family Solanaceae.)
In Ireland, the potato famine of 1845, caused by a parasitic fungus, resulted in many thousands of deaths from starvation, and led to large-scale emigration to the USA.
© Research Machines plc 2008. All rights reserved. Helicon Publishing is a division of Research Machines plc.
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