Morphological and Molecular Characterization of traditional and improved varieties of Basmati Rice (Oryza sativa L.)”

Abstract

This study was carried out to evaluate the genetic diversity of twenty two traditional and evolved basmati rice germplasms characterized based on morphological and molecular diversity used for breeding programmes. Fourteen morphological traits viz. Plant height, Days to 50% flowering, Day to physiological maturity, number of reproductive tiller, flag and primary leaf related trait (length, width and area), SPAD value, primary leaf area index, grain yield per plant, and test weight traits were showed most variation among the all genotypes. The results indicated that the highest genetic variability was observed in plant height, spikelets per panicle, panicle length, and days to maturity in this study. Using a panel of fourteen SSR primers, genetic polymorphism at molecular level was examined for characterization and differentiation of traditional and evolved basmati rice. Altogether 119 allelic variants including 50 unique alleles and 69 shared alleles were identified with an average of 8.50 alleles per primer using a panel of 14 primer pairs covering seven chromosomes. The primer pairs RM 1089, RM 3155, RM 1240, RM 3333, RM 3360, RM 8077, and RM 1209 appeared to be highly polymorphic and comparatively more informative for the purpose of molecular profiling of basmati rice entries. Based on the fourteen SSR primer panels for the genetic analysis of two major traditional and evolved group, while further divided into the two more group. The 14 primer pairs are not adequately information