Studies on genetic variability parameters in rice germplasm (Oryza sativa L.)

Abstract

Rice gives a great wealth of material for genetical studies because of its wide ecological distribution and enormous discrepancies encountered for multitudinous morphological and physiological characteristic. The rice germplasm provide with ample of genetic diversity and a treasury of valuable genes. It is a rich pool of important genes that plant breeders can exploit for crop improvement in present investigation fifty indigenous rice germplasm were evaluated to estimate the genetic variability parameters in yield and yield contributing characters during Kharif 2018. Analysis of variance indicated the existence of significant genotypic differences among the genotypes for the yield, its components for all the characters. High GCV and PCV values were observed for effective tillers per plant, leaf length of blade, thousand grain weight, biological yield per plant and harvest index. High heritability coupled with high genetic advance as per cent of mean was observed for thousand grain weight, leaf length of blade, effective tillers per plant and plant height which indicated that these traits were controlled by additive type of gene action. It is concluded that variation exists in the germplasm, which provides opportunities for this collection to be useful for genetic improvement.