Assessment and Induction of Variability in Chinese Potato (Solenostemon rotundifolius Poir.)

摘要

Sixty Coleus accessions collected from different eco-geographical regions of Kerala and neighbouring states indicated genetic diversity among themselves. High heritability was observed for tuber yield, harvest index, biological yield per plant, tubervolume and tuber weight. The sixty accessions were grouped into ten clusters which indicated that factors other than geographical distributions are responsible for clustering and that there was no parallelism between genetic diversity and geographical distribution. EMS induced genetic variability in Coleus was evaluated based on establishment of mutants under field conditions. The response of Coleus to mutagen varied with concentration as well as with genotype. EMS changed the size and number of tubers,plant height and also induced photo insensitivity. From the field performance of the selected mutants, M 131 and M 61 were identified for year round cultivation.