Genetic Divergence of Bitter Gourd (Momordica charantia L.) for Sixteen Important Yield Attributing Traits

Abstract

Genetic divergence among sixteen genotypes of Bitter gourd (Momordica charantia L.) for sixteen important yield attributing traits was studied using Mahalanobis D2 statistics. The total genotypes were grouped into 6 different clusters on similarities of D2 values. Among the different clusters, cluster I consisted the maximum number of genotypes (6 genotypes) followed by cluster II, cluster III and cluster IV (3 genotypes), and cluster V contain only one genotype. The highest intra- cluster distance was recorded for cluster I (2411.503) and lowest intra –cluster distance was observed in cluster V. Genotypes from cluster I could be used as parental line for hybrid breeding programme owing to their higher mean performance within group. The highest inter cluster distance found between cluster V and cluster I indicated wider genetic diversity among the genotypes between these groups. The present study revealed that the cluster IV showed highest mean values for fruit yield per plant and average fruit weight. Therefore, more emphases should be given to cluster IV for selecting genotypes as parents to produce new recombination with desire yield traits. Fruit yield/plant (g) contributed maximum (69.17%) toward total genetic divergence followed by fruit length (11.67% cm).The 2D PCA plot successfully grouped the samples according to their phenotypic resemblance and morphological characteristics. Selection of genotypes from distant clusters may be used in crop improvement programmes to produce populations with wide variability with transgressive segregants possessing high yielding.