Phenotypic and Genotypic Diversity of Global Finger Millet(Eleusine coracana (L.) Gaertn. ) Composite Collection

A Bharathi, 'Phenotypic and Genotypic Diversity of Global Finger Millet(Eleusine coracana (L.) Gaertn. ) Composite Collection', 2011

A composite collection of 1000 accessions that included 622 core collectionaccessions was developed, to study diversity and population structure and develop areference set of 300 genetically most diverse accessions using Simple Sequence Repeats(SSRs). The global composite collection of finger millet was evaluated in threeenvironments viz., 2005/2006 post rainy season at Tamil Nadu Agricultural University(TNAU), Coimbatore (E1), in 2006 (E2) and 2007 rainy (E3) seasons at ICRISAT,Patancheru centre, Hyderabad for various morpho-agronomic traits under fieldconditions. For qualitative traits, the accessions of composite collection showed higherfrequency for erect plant habit, green pigmentation, non lodging plant types, mediumglume prominence, semi-compact inflorescence and light brown seed colour. Highestimates of PCV, GCV and heritability in broad sense for most of the traits indicated thatthe yield attributes were stable with less environmental influence and variability could beexploited for selection of these traits. The traits such as number of basal tillers, ear headlength, finger number, length of longest finger and flag leaf blade length exhibited apositive and significant phenotypic correlation and direct effect with grain yield in all thethree or two environments indicating selection on these traits will simultaneouslyimprove the yield. Stability analysis revealed wide range for linear regression (bi) whichindicated variable responses of genotypes to environmental changes