Selection Criteria for Drought-Tolerant Bread Wheat Genotypes at Seedling Stage

Diminishing water resources as a result of excessive use of water for irrigation and climate change posture a severe global threat to food security. Herein, an experiment was conducted to determine the selection criteria for drought-tolerant bread wheat genotypes at the seedling stage using morpholo...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Sustainability 2019-05, Vol.11 (9), p.2584
Main Authors: Ahmed, Hafiz, Sajjad, Muhammad, Li, Mingju, Azmat, Muhammad, Rizwan, Muhammad, Maqsood, Rana, Khan, Sultan
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Cell membranes
Chlorophyll
Cluster analysis
Drought
Drought resistance
Field tests
Genetic diversity
Genotypes
Germplasm
Heat
Heat stress
Heat tolerance
Plant breeding
Plant growth
Principal components analysis
Seedlings
Seeds
Spring wheat
Stomata
Sustainability
Wheat
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Diminishing water resources as a result of excessive use of water for irrigation and climate change posture a severe global threat to food security. Herein, an experiment was conducted to determine the selection criteria for drought-tolerant bread wheat genotypes at the seedling stage using morphological and photosynthetic pigmentation-related traits. A panel of 105 wheat landraces, historical Pakistani varieties, and advance breeding lines were evaluated under normal and drought stress using factorial completely randomized design. The root length, fresh weight, dry weight, cell membrane thermo-stability, and chlorophyll b were positively correlated among themselves under both normal and stress conditions. Hence, selection of any one of these traits enhances the performance of other traits. The shoot length was non-significant and negatively associated with all other studied characters except relative water content. The results suggested that selection for shoot length could not improve genetic gain for drought tolerance. Out of 10 principal components (PCs), the first three PCs were showed significant genetic variation under both conditions. The first three PCs showed 74.6% and 76% cumulative genetic variation under normal and drought conditions, respectively. Based on PCA, 10 drought-tolerant and five drought-susceptible genotypes were identified. Overall results suggested that selection for root length, fresh weight, dry weight, cell membrane thermo-stability, and chlorophyll b at the seedling stage would improve genetic gain for drought tolerance. The outperforming genotypes under drought stress conditions can be useful in future wheat breeding programs, and early selection for the traits recommended in this study will be effective for developing high-yielding and drought-tolerant wheat varieties.
ISSN:2071-1050
2071-1050
DOI:10.3390/su11092584