Tomato

The tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) is a plant in the Solanaceae or nightshade family, as are its close cousin’s tobacco, chili peppers, potato, and eggplant. The tomato is subject to Central, South, and southern North America from Mexico to Peru. It is a perennial, often grown outdoors in temperate climates as an annual, typically attainment to 1–3 m (3 to 10 ft) in height, with a weak, woody stem that often vines over other plants.

The leaves are 10–25 cm long, pinnate, with 5–9 leaflets, each leaflet up to 8 cm long, with a jagged margin; both the stem and leaves are thickly glandular-hairy. The flowers are 1–2 cm across, yellow, with five sharp lobes on the corolla; they are borne in a cyme of 3–12 together. The word tomato derives from an expression in the Nahuatl language, tomatl. The exact name, lycopersicum, means "wolf-peach" compare the related species S. lycocarpum, whose scientific name means "wolf-fruit", common name "wolf-apple".