Diallel Analysis of Grain Yield and Some Other Traits in Yellow Maize (Zea mays L.) Inbred Lines

Abstract

Eight advanced inbred lines derived from different yellow maize populations were crossed in a half diallel mating scheme in 2010 season at Gemmeiza Agric. Res. Station. The resultant 28 crosses along with two commercial check hybrids i.e. SC 166 and SC 173 were evaluated at two locations i.e. Gemmeiza and Mallawy Agric. Res. Stations in 2011 season. Mean squares due to crosses, G.C.A. and S.C.A. were highly significant for all studied traits. The ratio of Ʃg2i/ ƩS2ij indicated that the nonadditive gene effects played the major role in the inhertance of all the studied traits. For grain yield, one parental inbred line P3 had significant positive GCA effects and six crosses P1xP2, P1xP6, P2xP4, P3xP8, P5xP7 and P6xP7 had significant or highly significant positive SCA effects. One cross P3xP8 gave similar productivity to that of SC 166. Also two crosses P3xP5 and P5xP7 exhibited similar yield performance to that of the check hybrid SC 173, since no significant difference. These promising crosses may be released as commercial hybrids by maize research program after further testing. Keywords: maize, diallel crosses, gene effect. INTRODUCTION: Diallel crosses in maize was developed by Sprague and Tatum (1942) who partitioned the variation among F 1 crosses resulting from inbred lines to general (G.C.A.) and specific (S.C.A.) combining ability. Matzinger et al. (1959) revealed that the G.C.A. variance is a function of additive variance, while S.C.A. variance is a function of the non-additive variance. Griffing (1956) gave a complete analysis of diallel crosses for fixed and random set of parents. El-Shamarka (1995), Mostafa et al. (1996), Abd El-Aty and Katta (2002) and Ibrahim et al. (2010) reported that specific combining ability effects were much more important in the inheritance of grain yield and its components.

Diallel Analysis of Grain Yield and Some Agronomic Traits in New Seven Yellow Maize Inbred Lines

“…So, it would not be effective to make selection on the basis of evaluation in a single environment and more environments are needed. Similar results were obtained by El-Hosary (1989), Barakat et al (2003) and Osman et al (2012), They found that the interactions between both types of combining abilities and the environment were highly significant. Variances due to SCA × location were not significant for all studied traits, except for plant height and grain yield per feddan where variances were significant.…”