ICRISAT Archival Report 2006 - The seedlings of success in the ...

Pigeonpea
Output B. Annually knowledge of the improvements of the biotechnological and conventional tools designed
to facilitate drought and salinity tolerance breeding and germplasm of mandate crops and associated capacity
building made available to partners internationally
MTP Output Target 2006: New germplasm with early maturity to avoid drought developed and made available to
partners
We have made use of drought avoidance traits like earliness and high root volume for breeding lines suitable for
drought prone areas. We have field tested a few promising extra short duration lines such as ICPL 88039, MN 5,
MN 8 and ICPL 88039 in the drought prone conditions of Rajasthan, India. The variety ICPL 88039 was found
superior in terms of yield (over 21%) and earliness (about two weeks) over the popular check ‘Manak’. To follow up
we have multiplied breeder’s seed of ICPL 88039, MN 5 and MN 8 for distribution to the NARS partners, and for
testing in their locations under local practices.
The recently developed photo-insensitive extra-early (90 days) breeding lines have permitted pigeonpea cultivation in
new niches at higher latitudes and altitudes. Some seed of this line (ICPL 88039) have been dispatched to partners.
This line is already showing impact because it has led to the diversification of the rice-wheat system in north India
with about 0.2 million ha additional pigeonpea area being grown. Since the available short-duration varieties are
susceptible to diseases like sterility mosaic (SMD), lines have been developed that combine early maturity and SMD
resistance, in particular ICP11632, ICP 11719, ICP 16665, ICP16166, ICP16169, ICP16293, ICP14399. The early
maturity of these lines would confer on them a useful drought escape mechanism. A large number of trials have
been performed in farmer’s field to test for SMD resistance in early maturing lines.
In term of seed production and distribution of early maturing materials, 795kg of ICPL 88039, 25kg of ICPL 87 and
25 kg of ICPL 87091 have been produced to cater for national and international demand for seeds of early maturity
types. A recent extra effort in the area of pigeonpea production has been made in the Philippines where the early
maturity line ICPL 88039 has been sent for preliminary testing.
KB Saxena
Output target 6B.1: High throughput molecular genetic and phenotyping platforms and promising transgenic
events for salinity tolerance in pigeonpea available for commercialization and introgression in locally adapted
germplasm
Activity 6B.1.1: Identify superior pigeonpea genotypes for salinity tolerance
Milestone: A set of pigeonpea genotypes suitable for breeding salinity tolerant breeding lines identified (VV/KBS)
2009
Identify superior pigeonpea genotypes for salinity tolerance: We assessed the morphological and physiological
variation in pigeonpea for salinity tolerance in 300 genotypes, including the minicore collection of pigeonpea, wild
accessions, and landraces from putatively saline prone areas worldwide. There was a large variation in the salinity
susceptibility index (SSI) and the percent relative reduction (RR %) in both cultivated and wild accessions. The
amount of Na + accumulation in shoot showed that more tolerant cultivated materials accumulated less Na in shoot.
Such relationship was not true for the wild species. Wild species such as C. acutifolius, C. cajanifolius, and C.
lineata were highly sensitive, whereas C. platycarpus, C. scarabaeoides, and C. sericeus were tolerant. It was
interesting to note that C. scarabaeoides also provided a large range of sensitive materials. The minicore collection
of pigeonpea provided a large range of variation for salinity tolerance. Among the tolerant genotypes, there were a
large number of tolerant accessions originating from Bangladesh. Data were published in the 2 nd issue of the
electronic Journal of the Semi Arid Tropic Agriculture Research, and is available online at: www.icrisat.org. The
methods and traits used to assess salinity tolerance in groundnut and pigeonpea have been put together in a paper
submitted to the Indian Journal of Crop Science.
Vincent Vadez and KB Saxena
Activity 6B.1.2: Develop intra- and inter-specific mapping population of pigeonpea between contrasting
materials for salinity tolerance
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