Identifying yellow corn inbreds for developing hybrids with salinity tolerance
2011
Santos, P.J.A. | Descalsota,J.C. | Ladia, V.A. | Salazar, A.M., Philippines Univ. Los Banos, College, Laguna (Philippines)
Recent changes in climatic condition have been observed in different agro-ecological zones which led to different environmental stresses and subsequently resulted to yield decrease. Salinity is one of the stresses projected to spread throughout different agricultural areas especially in places located near coastal regions with high evaporation rate and with low precipitation. One of the simplest management options is to use tolerant varieties. Like any other crop, corn is also affected by this stress and it is considered a moderately tolerant crop. A study was initiated in the Institute of Plant Breeding (IPB) to develop yellow corn varieties with salenic tolerance. Initial activity includes screening yellow corn inbreds grown in salenic nutrient culture up to seedling stage. Consequently, three inbreds, namely, APS 19B-B-55-1-2-B, Tupi yellow (D) 86-2-1-1-B and APS 9B-37-2-2-B were identified to have salinity tolerance based on chlorophyll index, dry matter yield and survival. They were further evaluated for salt tolerance in a pot experiment that followed using four levels of salinity (control, 5 dS/m, 10 dS/m, 15 dS/m) imposed using saline irrigation water. Agronomic and physiological characteristics were collected such as number of primary roots, root volume, root and shoot length, total leaf area, plant height, root and shoot biomass, SPAD reading, days to tassel and days to flowering. Results showed that increasing salinity generally reduced all the parameters measured for the four varieties. However, the three inbreds showed almost the same degree of responses under different levels of salinity thus they were chosen to be used as parents in the diallel crosses. The diallel crosses will then serve as the primer for the production of yellow corn hybrid with salinity tolerance.
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