Chocolate is made from cocoa beans, the dried and fermented seeds of the cacao tree ("Theobroma cacao"), a small, 4–8 m tall (15–26 ft tall) evergreen tree native to the deep tropical region of the Americas. Recent genetic studies suggest the most common genotype of the plant originated in the Amazon basin and was gradually transported by humans throughout South and Central America. Early forms of another genotype have also been found in what is now Venezuela. The scientific name, "Theobroma", means "food of the gods". The fruit, called a cacao pod, is ovoid, long and wide, ripening yellow to orange, and weighing about when ripe.