Sierra de Manantlan Biosphere Reserve

The Jalisco highlands reserve where researchers discovered in 1977 that the ancestor of all cultivated corn — Zea diploperennis, or wild perennial teosinte — still grows in the wild is one of the most scientifically significant plant discoveries of the 20th century and fundamentally altered the direction of corn breeding research globally. The reserve's cloud forest ecosystem harbors over 2,600 vascular plant species.