Genetic diversity analysis using Mahalanobis’s D2 and Principal component analysis of aloe vera (Aloe barbadensis L.)

Abstract

In present investigation carried out study the genetic diversity in thirty-seven Aloe barbadensis accessions along with check (GAKP-1) were evaluated at research cum instructional farm of Dept. of Genetics & Plant Breeding, IGKV, Raipur during 2023-24 in RCBD in two replication. The genetic diversity was analysed through Mahalanobis’s D2 statistics and principal component analysis (PCA). The Mahalanobis’s D2 statistics revealed that the maximum inter cluster distance was observed in between VI and VII (266.9) have single accession CGAV-19 and CGAV-35 respectively which depicts hybridization involving these two diverse parents expected to produce greater frequency of better segregates in desirable combination for improvement of genetic stock and development of variety. The PCA revealed that out of ten only three principal components (PCs) exhibited >1 Eigen value, and showed about 78% variability among the traits studied. The PC-I shows 42.42% followed by PC-II showed 23.68% and PC-III exhibited 11.94% and account for 78% variability for traits under study. The first PC accounts for as much of the variability in the data as possible, and each succeeding component accounts for as much of the remaining variability as possible. The present study depicted that morphological trait is useful in preliminary evaluation to access genetic diversity among morphological distinct aloe vera genotype.