CONTENTS

ASSESSMENT OF GENETIC DIVERSITY IN Capsicum spp.
(1U), 2.0l of dNTPs (1mM) and 2.0l of 10X PCR
buffer and remaining sterile water were used. The
bands were manually scored as ‘1’ for the presence
and ‘O’ for the absence and the binary data was used
for statistical analysis. This band data was subjected
to cluster analysis using STATISTICAL software. A
dendrogram was constructed by un-weighted pairgroup
arithmetic mean (UPGMA). The dissimilarity
martrix was developed using Squared Euclidean
Distance (SED), which estimated all the pair wise
differences in the amplification product. Only clear
and unambigous bands were taken into account and
the bands were not scored if they were faint or
diffused, as such fragments possess poor
reproducibility.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
All the eight characters under study varied
significantly among nineteen cultivars (Table 3). Plant
height for each cultivar was recorded when first fruit
had begun to ripen in 50 percent of the plants and
significant differences were observed among the
cultivars studied. The maximum plant height was
recorded with the line IC 361897 (45 cm) followed by
IC 397238 (44), while the minimum was recorded with
EC 362928 (32 cm) (Table 4). Significant differences
were observed for days to 50 percent flowering.
Among the cultivars studied IC 119275 (56) took
maximum days while, the line EC 382049 (45) took
minimum number of days to 50 percent flowering.
Considerable differences were observed for days
taken to fruit maturity. Arka suphal, took maximum
(97) days, while EC 362928 took minimum (70)
number to days for fruit maturity. Significant variance
indicated the role of non additive gene action in the
inheritance of all traits.
Fruit weight was highest in IC 119234 (31 g)
and least was in EC 362928 (9 g). Highest 10000
seed weight was recorded in cultivar Arka Suphal (6
g) followed by line IC 361897 (6 g) and lowest seed
weight was recorded in EC 121489 (3 g). Highest
number of seeds per fruit was recorded in line IC
119230 (90) and it was lowest in line IC 381108 (28).
All genotypes displayed considerable amount of
difference in their mean performance with respect to
all eight characters studied. This has also been
exemplified by significant values of mean sum of
square for these traits, which indicated that the lines
under study were genetically diverse.
The phenotypic variance was higher than
genotypic variance for all the characters. Phenotypic
coefficient of variation ranged form 10.06 (days taken
to maturity) to 36.04 (fruit weight). Genotypic
coefficient of variation ranged from 8.28 (days taken
to 50% flowering) to 32.04 (fruit weight). The
estimates of heritability ranged from 37.18 percent
(days taken to 50% flowering) to 98.75 percent (seed
weight). Genetic advance expressed as percentage
over mean ranged from 10.40 per cent (days to 50
percent flowering) to 58.66 percent (fruit weight).
Along with the variability information, genotypic and
phenotypic coefficient of variations and genetic
advance mean is much more essential because these
are more reliable for effective selection. The
phenotypic coefficient of variation (PVC) was higher
than genotypic coefficient of variation (GCV) for all
characters under study which suggest that these
traits studied had low environmental influence. Patel
et. al., 2004 and Kumar et. al, 2007 made similar
observations in their study in chilli. High values of
GCV and PCV were obtained for fruit length (cm),
fruit weight and seeds weight, indicating that variation
for these characters contributes markedly to the total
variability. Heritability value indicates only the
magnitude of inheritance of quantitative character
while genetic advance helps in deciding the selection
procedure to be adopted. However, in the present
study the high heritability along with high value of
genetic advance coupled with medium to high percent
mean of genotypic variance for characters i.e. seed
weight, fruit length (cm), fruit weight and number of
seeds per fruit are of great value for selection as
they are more likely to be controlled by additive gene
effect.
Based on D2 analysis nineteen genotypes
were grouped into two clusters. Among the clusters,
cluster-I was the largest with seventeen genotypes
and cluster-II contain only two genotypes (Arka
Suphal and Arka Lohit). The intra cluster distance in
cluster I was 14.68 and cluster II was 21.83. While,
the inter cluster distance between cluster-I and
cluster- II is 19.89.
Twenty- Five microstatillite primers were
used to amplify the repeated regions in the chilli
samples. Out of twenty five primes, all the primers
were successfully amplified. The dendrogram was
constructed by un-weighted pair-group arithmetic
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