GENETIC ANALYSIS OF WHEAT ACCESSIONS FOR YIELD CONTRIBUTING TRAITS UNDER WATER DEFICIT CONDITION

Current research was conducted in the field area of Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics, University of Agriculture Faisalabad during 2018-19. Six parents were used as female lines and three parents as male testers. F1 along with their parents were sown under drought and normal conditions in a randomized complete block design. Data were recorded for flag leaf area, chlorophyll contents, plant height, spike length, spikelets per spike, grains per spike, grain weight per spike, relative water contents, spike density, weight of 1000-grain, grain yield from each plant and tillers per plant. F1 plants and their parents were evaluated for general as well as for specific combining ability. The SSR marker-based screening of parental genotypes was also conducted using 4SSR markers related to drought tolerance. Under normal water conditions, parent Chakwal-50 was a good general combiner for plant height and 1000 grain weight, 9774 perform best for spike length and grain weight per spike. Line BARS-2009 performed best for tillers per plant, number of spikes per plant. In drought conditions, for plant height parent AAS11, Chakwal-50 and 10137 gave significant results. Line BARS-2009 and 9774 gave desirable results for number of tillers per plant. Under normal water condition, cross 9774 × Kohistan 97, Chakwal-50 × Sialkot-13, Chakwal-50 × 9733, BARS-2009 × 9496 and Punjab 2011 × Sialkot-13 performed well for chlorophyll content, flag leaf area, 1000-grain weight and tillers/plant. In drought conditions, crosses 9774 × Kohistan 97, AAS-11 × Sialkot-13, 10137 × Sialkot-13 and 10137 × 9496 performed good for plant height, grain weight per spike, flag leaf area and yield per plant. So, it was concluded from physiological and molecular analysis results that among parents Chalwal-50, BARS-2009, 9496 and 10137 were better performing for drought and can be included in future breeding program.