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Climate change in recent years has affected crop production to a greater extent. To overcome these effects, climate-resilient varieties are needed. Tomato is a versatile crop. However, its growth is hindered when it is affected by drought stress. Hence, a variability analysis of tomatoes under drought stress was carried out at Horticulture College and Research Institute, Coimbatore. Variability studies revealed that all the crosses for all parameters exhibited higher phenotypic coefficient of variation (PCV) values than genotypic coefficient of variation (GCV), indicating the influence of environmental effects. For all the crosses, viz., EC169966 × LE118, EC177824 × LE27 and Arka Ashish × LE27, high PCV and high GCV were recorded for characteristics including fruit number per plant, yield per plant, lycopene content and peroxidase activity. Characteristics such as the number of flowers per cluster, fruit number per plant, individual weight of fruit, yield per plant, relative water content, proline content, peroxidase activity and ascorbic acid content recorded higher heritability coupled with high genetic advance as a percentage of the mean (GAM). Thus, direct selection of the above parameters improves drought-tolerant breeding programs in tomato. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Seventy four French bean germplasms were evaluated for twenty two quantitative traits to study the genetic variability, heritability and genetic advance during Jan-Feb in G.B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, Pantnagar. Significant differences were observed among all genotypes. Higher genotypic and phenotypic coefficient of variability were observed for plant height, seed yield per plant, pod yield per plant, pod yield per hectare, number of pods per cluster, number of pods per plant and 100 seed weight (42.45% and 43.30%, 39.72% and 42.34%, 27.59% and 32.12%, 27.59% and 32.12%, 25.01% and 28.14%, 24.56% and 26.76% and 22.65% and 22.96% respectively). High heritability coupled with high genetic advance over mean were observed for plant height, seed yield per plant, pod yield per plant, pod yield per hectare, number of pods per plant, 100 seed weight, number of pods per cluster, leaf length, single pod weight, pod diameter, pod length, number of pod clusters per plant, leaf width, seed length, number of seeds per pod and seed width (96.34% and 85.73%, 88.03% and 76.77%, 73.80% and 48.83%, 73.80% and 48.83%, 84.20% and 46.42%, 97.34% and 46.04%, 45.78% and 78.96%, 38.88% and 89.58%, 38.21% and 92.70%, 92.69% and 35.45%, 90.13% and 34.48%, 32.47% and 79.39%, 28.03% and 79.60%, 26.92% and 99.04%, 56.27% and 24.85%, and 97.82% and 24.01% respectively) indicate predominance additive gene action. Thus, there is ample scope for improving these characters through direct selection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Twelve genotypes of eggplant in BC3, BC4 and BC5 generations of CMS-lines derived from Solanum aethiopicum × Solanum melongena cross along with their maintainers were evaluated for eighteen quantitative characters at Punjab Agricultural University Ludhiana. Analysis of variance depicted significant variation (P ≤ 0.05) for all the characters in all generations. High PCV and GCV values were observed for fruit length, fruit girth, fruit weight, number of fruits plant-1 and yield plant-1 in all generations indicating high variability in the germplasm. High heritability coupled with high genetic advance was found for peduncle length, fruit length, fruit girth, fruit weight, number of fruits plant-1 and yield plant-1 in all generations indicating the predominance of additive gene action for these traits. Thus, selections can be made from present germplasm for the development of improved CMS inbred lines with varying fruit traits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The field experiment was carried out at the research farm of Horticulture Garden, Bihar Agricultural College, Sabour, Bhagalpur during 2014-15 for assessment of genetic variability among different genotypes of cape gooseberry in India. The experiment was laid out in Randomized Block Design with three replications having twelve genotypes. Analysis of variance revealed significant differences among genotypes for all the traits studies which suggesting sufficient variability for yield and quality parameters. The overall values of phenotypic coefficient of variation (PCV) were higher than those of genetic coefficient of variation (GCV). Higher magnitude of GCV and PCV were recorded for fruit per plant percent (33.30 and 36.61) followed by fruit diameter, fruit weight and flowers per branch. The maximum GCV (33.30) and PCV (36.61) were recorded in fruits/plant respectively. The high values of GCV are the indication of excess variability among the genotypes and thus the scope for crop improvement depends on the selection of superior parents for crossing to get better parents for hybridization. In present study, the magnitude of heritability ranged from 37% to 98% indicating that these traits are controlled by additive gene action which is very useful in selection. The traits like plant girth, plant height, inter nodal length, appearance of 50% of flowering, bud break to full bloom, number of flowers per branch, number of fruits set per branch, duration of fruit set to maturity, fruit weight, fruit diameter and number of fruits per plant with high GCV, PCV, heritability and genetic advance as percentage of mean, indicating that these characters are under additive gene effects and more reliable for effective selection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sixteen diverse genotypes of fenugreek (Trigonella foenum-graecum L.) were grown in five (E1 to E5) environments which were created by different date of sowing during the rabi seasons at the Vegetable Farm of CCS HAU, Hisar. (29°15'N, 75°69'E) during 2012-13. Observations were recorded on ten randomly selected plants from each genotypes in each replications for characters viz. field emergence index, days to 50 % flowering, plant height, number of pods per plant, number of branches per plant, number of seeds per pod, pod length, seed yield (q/ha), test weight, seed germination, seed vigour index-I and II. The estimation of genotypic and phenotypic coefficients (GCV and PCV) variation in all the environments was consistently decreasing with the delaying in sowing date for all the character studied except plant height and test weight indicating that the environmental influence was comparatively more pronounced for these characters in expressing the phenotypic performance of different genotypes. Highest GCV and PCV was estimated as 50.36 % and 55.93 %, respectively for seed vigour index-I in E1. High value of heritability estimated for characters seed yield, seed vigour index-II, seed germination and branches per plant (above 70 %) in E1 revealed that these were less influenced by environment and low heritability estimated for days to 50 % flowering in E2, plant height in E2, seeds per pod in E3, field emergence index in E5 indicated high influence of environment. Based on environmental indices, the environment E2 was most favourable for all the characters studied except field emergence index. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]