Enhancement of Genetic Variability for Yield and Component Traits through Recombination followed by Induced Mutagenesis in Greengram [Vigna radiata (L.) Wilczek]

Aim: Greengram is a self-pollinated crop which show very less variability to develop improved varieties through only hybridization or induced mutation breeding. Therefore, we have taken a new pace to create more variability by combining both recombinations with induced mutation through gamma rays irradiation. For this purpose, the F2 seeds were irradiated with gamma rays at BARC, Mumbai and sown to grow the F2M1 generation and subsequently the superior mutant lines with high degree variability with high GCV and genetic advances were selected from F2M2 generation of the mutant population.

Methodology: The present investigation was carried out during kharif-2017 and rabi-summer 2017-18 at the experimental plot, All India Coordinated Research Projects (AICRP) on MULLaRP, main Agricultural Research Station, College of Agriculture, University of Agricultural Sciences, Dharwad, Karnataka, India. The experiment was laid out in an augmented design.

Results: The mutant progenies obtained from the crosses DGGV-2 × IPM-410-3 and DGGV-2 × SML-1815 in F2M2 generation have shown high PCV and GCV for the characters like plant height, number of clusters per plant and number of seeds per pod etc. when irradiated with 100 kR gamma rays. The mutant breeding lines derived from the crosses DGGV-7 × V-02-709 and DGGV-7 × V-02-802 with irradiation dose of 20 kR, have shown higher number of pods per cluster and higher number of pods per plant with high heritability. More variability was observed with higher dose (100 kR) of mutation even though it showed higher mortality rate.

Conclusion: Irradiation of F2 progeny (DGGV-2 × SML-1815) with 100 kR has generated more genetic variability for seed yield per plant (10.8 g), when compared to the check DGGV-2 (4.7 g) and SML-1815 (9.8 g). So, priority should be given to those characters which are having high heritability coupled with high genetic advance as per cent mean to get better selection gains. The breeding lines which showed higher degree of variability can be utilized in the future breeding programme for development of high yielding genotypes.