Exploring genetic variation for salinity tolerance in chickpea using image-based phenotyping.

ABSTRACT: Soil salinity results in reduced productivity in chickpea. However, breeding for salinity tolerance is challenging because of limited knowledge of the key traits affecting performance under elevated salt and the difficulty of high-throughput phenotyping for large, diverse germplasm collections. This study utilised image-based phenotyping to study genetic variation in chickpea for salinity tolerance in 245 diverse accessions. On average salinity reduced plant growth rate (obtained from tracking leaf expansion through time) by 20%, plant height by 15% and shoot biomass by 28%. Additionally, salinity induced pod abortion and inhibited pod filling, which consequently reduced seed number and seed yield by 16% and 32%, respectively. Importantly, moderate to strong correlation was observed for di

SUBMITTER: Atieno J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5430978 | biostudies-literature | 2017 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature