GENETIC VARIABILITY AND CHARACTER ASSOCIATION OF YIELD AND YIELD CONTRIBUTING TRAITS IN BRINJAL (Solanum melongena L.) GENOTYPES

Abstract

The experiment was carried out using 20 genotypes of brinjal at the farm of Sher-e- Bangla Agricultural University, Dhaka to determine the genetic variability, correlation and path coefficient for yield and its contributing traits during August 2019 to March 2020. Significant variations were observed among the brinjal genotypes for all the parameters under study. Mean comparison table shows variation exist among all the characters. Phenotypic variance and phenotypic coefficient of variation (PCV) was higher than the genotypic variance and genotypic coefficient of variation (GCV) for all the characters under studied. High estimate of heritability coupled with moderate to high GCV, PCV and genetic advance observed in plant height, fruit weight, fruit length, fruit diameter, pedicel length, number of fruits/plant, leaf are index, percent of BSFB infestation and yield/plant which indicated the effect of additive genes. The correlation coefficient revealed that yield per plant had the highly significant positive correlation with number of fruits per plant indicating this character can be considered for phenotypic selection for future brinjal improvement program. The path coefficient had direct positive effect with days to 1 st fruit harvest, days to last fruit harvest, plant height, number of primary branches/plant, number of secondary branches/plant, fruit weight, number of fruits/plant and percent of BSFB infestation which indicated that promising selection would be rewarding for those traits. Among five clusters, cluster I had the maximum of nine and the cluster IV and V had the minimum of 1 genotype respectively. The highest intra-cluster distance was observed in cluster I followed by III. The highest inter-cluster distance was observed between cluster III and V and the lowest between the cluster I and IV. The characters such as fruit length, fruit diameter, leaf area index and yield/plant contributed maximum towards divergence among the genotypes. Analyzing genetic variation, cluster analysis, intra and inter cluster distance and agronomic performances, the genotype 6 from cluster III, genotype 15 from cluster V and genotype 17 from cluster IV might be selected as promising parents for future hybridization program.