Genetic analysis of seed protein content and its association with seed weight and yield in pigeonpea

Abstract

To investigate inheritance of seed protein content (SPC) and its relationships with agronomic traits in pigeonpea, four elite germplasm lines with diverse genetics blackgram were used to develop three crosses. Each cross consisted of six generations (P1, P2, F1, F2, BC1P1 and BC1P2). Generation mean analysis revealed the importance of dominance and epistatic effects for SPC. Duplicate and negative additiveby- additive epistasis was predominant and associated with transgressive segregation for SPC. Additive genetic variance component was higher than the environmental and dominance components. Broad-sense heritability ranged from 0.52 to 0.60. Predicted genetic gain after one cycle of selection was highest at 5% selection intensity. Seed weight (positively) and yield (negatively) correlated with SPC. It is inferred from the study that appropriate selection of parents and reciprocal recurrent selection could be effective for improving SPC in pigeonpea with stabilized yields.