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The gaining attention of underutilized oat crops for both food and feed, mining of quality and yield related genes/QTLs from available germplasms of oat is need of the hour. The large family of grasses has a vast number of germplasms that could be harnessed for bio-prospecting. The selection of cross-compatible oat germplasms by molecular markers could be used for the introgression of the novel traits into the elite background of oats. The process needs a thorough study of genetic diversity to see the evolutionary relatedness among germplasms. Considering this, in the present study, the genetic diversity of 38 oat germplasms with 12 agro-morphological traits was carried out using 22 Inter Simple Sequence Repeat (ISSR) markers. We found a high level of polymorphism and 158 distinctive alleles; on average 7.18 alleles per primer, further, high-yielding genotypes were identified with the help of phenotypic data and genetic diversity was analyzed by using DNA fingerprint-based principal component analysis, UPGMA dendrogram. Among these 38 germplasms; eight were identified as superior under high grain yield (OS-424, OS-403, NDO-1101, OL-10, UPO-212, OS-405, OS-6, and OS-346) and another eight germplasms were identified as superior for the high fresh weight (for fodder purpose, NDO-711, RO-19, OL-14, OL-1760/OL-11, NDO-10, UPO-212, UPO-06-1, and RO-11-1). These results suggest that germplasms that are closely related (Cross-compatible) and have good potential for desirable traits could be used for varietal development by using marker-assisted selection.

Thirty brinjal genotypes were evaluated for eighteen quantitative characters in a randomized block design with three replications. Variability studies for 18 quantitative characters revealed that the phenotypic coefficient of variation (PCV) was comparatively greater than the corresponding genotypic coefficient of variation (GCV) for all the characters studied. Maximum PCV (59.49%) and GCV (59.48%) were registered for fruit weight. High estimates of heritability accompanied with high genetic advance as per cent of mean were recorded for most of the traits viz., fruit length, diameter, pedicel length, pedicel thickness, relative fruit calyx length, fruit weight, fruits per plant, the number of marketable fruits, marketable fruit yield and fruit yield per plant indicating the prominence of additive gene action, thus pointing towards the effectiveness of simple selection depending on the phenotypic expression of genotypes would be rewarding for genetic improvement of these characters. Significant positive correlation of fruit yield per plant at both genotypic and phenotypic levels with plant height, percentage of medium and long styled flowers, fruit setting percentage, fruit length, fruit diameter, fruit pedicel length, fruit pedicel thickness, fruit weight, marketable fruit yield and significant negative correlation with the number of primary branches, days to 50% flowering, days to first harvest, relative fruit calyx length, fruits per plant, total marketable fruits. Therefore, considering these characters would be beneficial in the selection for fruit yield per plant.