Study of genetic divergence in maize under drought condition

Abstract

Genetic divergence in 42 Maize inbred lines and hybrids including two check were assessed based on some morphological traits and grain yield using Mahalanobis D2-statistics. The experiment was conducted during rabi 2023 in RBD design under managed drought condition. The genotypes were grouped into fourteen clusters. The cluster I contained the highest number of lines (12), while the cluster II, III, VII, VIII, IX, X, XI, XII and XIV contained only single genotype. The maximum inter-cluster distance was noticed between the cluster XIII and XIV and minimum between cluster II and III. The highest intra-cluster distance was observed in the cluster VI (13.08). The genotypes in the cluster XIV showed better performances for characters like good cob length, cob diameter, kernel rows per cob and reasonable yielding ability. It is expected that crossing of inbred lines belonging high to medium D2 values may tend to produce for yield. Proline content had the greatest contribution to the genetic divergence. Days to pollen shedding and grain yield per plant were found to be responsible for primary differentiation.