Journal of Experimental Agriculture International

The study evaluated morpho-physiological and quality traits of 194 wheat genotypes to assess the genetic diversity and to identify elite genotypes for trait based breeding. The experiment was performed during 2023-24 crop season at Chaudhary Charan Singh Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar, Haryana, India. The material was planted in Augmented Design; each genotype occupied two rows of 2.5 m spaced at 20 cm under timely sown irrigated conditions. The results revealed distribution of genotypes into nine distinct clusters based on Bayesian Information Criterion (BIC) using the Ward’s method. The clustering pattern identified cluster IV as largest one with 62 genotypes whereas, cluster IX being smallest contained nine genotypes. The genetic distances indicated the genotypes of cluster VIII with relatively more diversity compared to genotypes belonging to other clusters. The results in addition also revealed the placement of cluster IV most distantly from cluster VIII as deciphered by maximum inter cluster distance among all cluster combinations. The genotypes of cluster VII portrayed better performance for biological and grain yield, could be explored in hybridization to accelerate yield improvement program. The study identified LBP 2023-24, PBW 824 and WH 1403 as elite genotypes based on grain yield and its attributes viz., biological yield per plot, number of grains per spike, number of spikelets per spike and number of tillers per meter. Further, RAJ 3448, LPB 2023-24 and HD 2864 demonstrated superiority for physiological and HUB 838, GW 513, RAJ 3448, PBW 824 and LPB 2023-24 showed better performance for quality traits with higher grain yield. Based on consideration of all the morpho-physiological and quality traits together under study, HUW 838, GW 513 and RAJ 3448 were recognized as elite genotypes, could be exploited in trait specific wheat breeding.