Genetic characterization of seedling progenies of elephant foot yam Amorphophallus paeoniifolius (Dennst.) for quantitative traits through principal component analysis

Abstract

A total of twenty six seedling progenies of elephant foot yam were evaluated for 24 quantitative characters at Horticultural Research Station, Kovvur to determine the pattern of variation, relationship among the individuals and their characteristics. The principal component analysis reduced the data set into seven principal components which explained 84.61% percent towards variability. The first principal component analysis accounted a maximum of 27.3% of the total variation and contributed by discriminating traits of pseudo-stem height, plant height, breadth of largest leaflet, height of corm and thickness of pseudo-stem base. In general, this study reveals the presence of diversity among 26 seedling progenies of elephant foot yam which can give opportunity for genetic improvement for desirable characters.