Genetic architecture of fruit yield and its contributing quantitative traits in Abelmoschus esculentus (L.) Moench

The genetic architecture of fruit yield and its related quantitative traits viz., days to first flowering, days to first picking, plantheight, primary branches per plant, stem girth, fruit length, fruit girth, fruit weight, fruits per plant and fruit yield per plantstudied through generation mean analysis using six basic generations (P1, P2, F1, F2, BC1 and BC2) of six crosses HRB-55 xAOL-05-4, VRO-5 x Red Long, VRO-6 x AOL-05-3, GO-2 x AOL-04-3, Arka Anamika x AOL-03-1 and Parbhani Kranti xAOL-03-6 in two environments (E1 and E2). Among the generations within the crosses, the sum of squares showed significantdifferences for all characters. Fixable type of gene effects viz., additive [d] and additive x additive [i] found significant fordays to first flowering in crosses HRB-55 x AOL-05-4 (E1), VRO-5 x Red Long (E2) and GO-2 x AOL-04-3 (E1). The similarkind of gene effects also observed for days to first picking (E1) and fruit weight (E2) in the cross GO-2 x AOL-04-3. In anothercase, dominance [h] and dominance x dominanace [l] which non-fixable gene effects were significant for days to firstflowering in crosses VRO-5 x Red Long (E2) and GO-2 x AOL-04-3 (E1); stem girth in VRO-6 x AOL-05-3 (E1) and fruitlength in Arka Anamika x AOL-03-1 (E1). Duplicate type of epistasis observed for days to first flowering in crosses, VRO-5 xRed Long (E2) and GO-2 x AOL-04-3 (E1); stem girth in VRO-6 x AOL-05-3 (E1) and fruit length in cross Arka Anamika xAOL-03-1 (E1). Results revealed additive and additive x additive types of fixable gene effects for days to first flowering anddays to first picking as well as fruit yield and its contributing traits in some cross-environment combinations. This suggestssimple selection or a single seed descent method could help for improvement of these traits. The results on epistatic geneeffects for fruit yield and its contributing component traits in different cross-environment combinations suggests that recurrentselection, bi-parental mating and inter se mating between desirable segregants followed by selection or multiple crosses offergood promising methods.