StudyOnGeneticDiversityAnalysisInCucumber(Cucumissativus L.)

Abstract

The field experiment entitled "Study on Genetic Diversity Analysis in Cucumber (Cucumis Sativus L)” wasconducted at Horticulture Research Centre, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel University of Agriculture and Technology, Meerut (UP)250110 during summer season in 2022. During the study the analysis of variance for 20 genotypes of Cucumber in therandomized block design and revealed significant difference for all the 16 characters, this indicated the presence of widespectrum of variability among the genotypes. The phenotypic coefficient of variation (PCV) was higher than the respectivegenotypiccoefficientofvariation(GCV)forallthetraits,anarrowdifferencebetweenPCVandGCVwererecordedforallof the traits. High heritability and genetic advance as per cent of mean were observed for all sixteen characters. The highestheritability was recorded in average fruit weight and lowest for days to first female flower anthesis. Correlation coefficientstudies indicated that genotypic correlation coefficient were found to be higher than phenotypic correlation coefficients formost of the characters, indicating a strong inherent association between various characters and significantly affected byenvironmental components in regard to phenotypic expression. Fruit yield kg per hectare expressed highly significant andpositive correlation with fruit yield per plot, fruit diameter, number of fruits per plant, average fruit weight, number of leavesper plant, fruit length and vine length. which implies that these characters were the primer contributing factors to fruit yield.All the combination of traits should be considered, while breeding programme for selecting high yielding genotypes andsuitable for breeders to achieving improved plant type. Path coffecient analysis revealed that the highest positive direct effecton fruit yield kilogram per hectare was observed for fruit diameter, fruit yield per plot, days to first male flower anthesis, daysto first female flower anthesis, vine length, node number to first male flower anthesis, node number to first female floweranthesis, number of fruits per plant and average fruit weight, Improvement of these characters might be improved. Theanalysis of genetic divergence through Mahalanobis D2 statistics revealed that a considerable genetic diversity was foundamong genotypes. 20 genotypes of Cucumberwere grouped into five clusters. The distributions of cucumber genotypes intofive clusters. Cluster I, II and IV contains maximum number of genotypes, that is 5 genotypes in each cluster and Cluster IIIconsistonly2genotypesthat isminimumnumberof genotypesoutof5clusters.. Basedonpresentinvestigation,itwasconcludedthatingeneral,therewasparallelismbetweengeneticandgeographic diversity. Maximum inter cluster distance was determined between clusters III and V so crosses among thesegenotypescanbe made asa parentforgettingbetterhybrids.