Variation and genetic analysis of fatty acid composition in flax (Linum usitatissimum L.)

Abstract

Flax (Linum usitatissimum L.) is an important source of oil rich in omega–3 fatty acids (especially α-linolenic acid accounting for > 50%), which is proven to have health benefits and utilized as an industrial raw material. α-Linolenic acid is a polyunsaturated fatty acid that readily undergoes oxidative transformation. Autoxidation of α-linolenic acid is the principal process contributing to the development of off-flavors, loss of color, and alteration in the nutritional value of linseed oil. However, there is huge a demand on the market for oils having different compositions of fatty acids, including the linseed oil characterized by improved stability. For this purpose, a complete diallel cross was performed in this study using six flax genotypes varying in the fatty acid content to estimate the genetic parameters. The analysis of variances carried out for the studied traits (content of oleic, linoleic and α-linolenic acid) indicated large differences among the genotypes. Variances due to GCA were much higher in magnitude than those related to SCA for the content of linoleic and α-linolenic acid, which indicated the superiority of additive gene effects in determining the inheritance of these traits. The nonadditive gene action played an important role for oleic acid content, since the magnitude of SCA effect was almost two times higher than GCA effect. The parental lines of linola (Linola KLA and Linola KLB) exhibited the highest concentration of favorable alleles for the two traits (high content of linoleic acid and low content of α-linolenic acid) and were thus found suitable for a continuous improvement program. On the basis of the SCA effect, five cross combinations, were found to be promising F1 hybrids for use as a source population for further selection, in order to achieve fatty acid changes in linseed. These combinations allow selecting varieties with 1:1 and 2:1 ratio of omega–6:omega–3 fatty acids for producing oil with an extended shelf life for food products.

Revealing seed color variation and their possible association with yield and quality traits in a diversity panel of flax (Linum Usitatissimum L.)

“…Relatively high heritability values, ranging from 0.64 to 0.93 for agromorphological and seed quality traits, indicated that genetic variance predominates in total phenotypic variance and there is ample scope for improving these traits through selection (Saroj et al, 2021). This finding is in line with other studies that reported high heritability values for agro-morphological and seed quality traits in flax (You et al, 2017;Dabalo et al, 2020;Walkowiak et al, 2022).…”

Selection of promising lines for yield and quality traits in advanced segregating generation of linseed

“…Relatively high heritability values were calculated for agro‐morphological traits, ranging from 0.66 to 0.78 (Table 4) suggesting that additive gene effects were primarily responsible for the genetic variation in agro‐morphological and seed quality traits and there is high scope for the improvement of these traits through selection. Likewise, Soto‐Cerda et al (2014), Pali and Mehta (2014), You et al (2017), Dabalo et al (2020), and Walkowiak et al (2022) found high heritability estimates for these traits in linseed. Moderately high estimates of heritability (0.54–0.60) were observed for seed yield, aspartic acid content, moisture content, starch content, and ash content (Table 4).…”

“…Therefore, a selection procedure is considered as the best option for improving such traits through accumulating favorable alleles from parents with high GCA in the target genotype (Singh et al, 2019; Walkowiak et al, 2022). Previous studies also found that the contribution of additive effects in controlling the above traits was higher than the dominance component in linseed (Abdel‐Moneam, 2014; Delourme et al, 2006; El‐Kady & Abo‐Kaied, 2010; Singh et al, 2009; Sood et al, 2007; Walkowiak et al, 2022). The range of variation between the highest and lowest mean values for each trait was high that specifies a better scope of selection (Table 4).…”

Cleaved Amplified Polymorphic Sequences (CAPS) Markers for Characterization of the LuFAD3A Gene from Various Flax (Linum usitatissimum L.) Cultivars

“…Based on the classification and origin of the studied cultivars, their characteristics are presented in Table 1. The cultivars of flax used in our research were previously described by Walkowiak et al [15] and selected for the marker analysis. The two cultivars of flax Szafir and Oliwin have a very high α-linolenic acid content (>58%).…”