Inheritance of foliar blast resistance in pearl millet ( Pennisetum glaucum).

With 1 table Abstract Foliar blast, caused by Pyricularia grisea (Cooke) Sacc, has recently emerged as a serious disease of pearl millet in India. To study the inheritance of resistance to this disease, two resistant restorer lines (ICMR 06222 and ICMR 07555) and two susceptible maintainer lines (ICMB 95444 and ICMB 89111) were selected on the basis of foliar blast reaction in tests conducted under field and greenhouse conditions. Each of the two resistant parents was crossed with two susceptible parents to generate four sets of F₁s, F₂s and their backcrosses with both resistant and susceptible parental lines. These were evaluated for disease reaction with artificial inoculation under both field and greenhouse conditions. The disease reaction of the F₁s, and the segregation patterns of resistance in the F₂s and backcross generations, showed that resistance to foliar blast in pearl millet is controlled by a single dominant gene. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]