GENETIC DIVERSITY AND CHARACTER ASSOCIATION OF Brassica napus L.

Abstract

A field experiment was conducted with 40 genotypes of Brassica napus L. at the experimental field of Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University, Dhaka to study the genetic diversity and characters association during November 2013 to March 2014. The experiment was laid out in Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with three replications. Analysis of variance for each trait showed significance differences among the genotypes. The first two components with eigen value were greater than other components. The highest inter cluster distance was observed between cluster II and V and the maximum intra cluster distance was found in cluster I. Comparatively phenotypic variances were higher than the genotypic variances for all the characters studied. Number of siliqua per plant (99.986) exhibited the highest value of heritability and number of primary branches per plant (26.459) exhibited the lowest value of heritability. Correlation coefficients among the characters were studied to determine the association between yield and yield components. The significant positive correlation with seed yield per plant was found in days to 1st flowering, days to 80% flowering, days to maturity, number of primary branches per plant, number of secondary branches per plant and siliqua per plant. Path co-efficient analysis revealed that days to 1st flowering, days to 50% flowering, days to 80% flowering, days to maturity, number of secondary branches per plant, number of siliquae per plant, and thousand-seed weight (gm) had the positive direct effect on yield per plant. Considering group distance and other agronomic performance genotypes G5 (Nap-0837), G2 (Nap-0733-1), G37 (Nap-2066), G31 (Nap-9901), G40 (Nap- 108) and G11 (BARI- 8) might be suggested for future hybridization program.