| |
Morphological diversity of South Indian banana cultivars
RESMI L. and AS NAIR
Abstract:
Morphological diversity analysis of 38 Musa cultivars from Kerala was carried out using a total of fifty one traits including vegetative, inflorescence, floral and fruit characteristics based on descriptors for banana. The UPGMA-derived dendrogram based on vegetative characters revealed two main clusters: cluster I, which consisted of twenty-one cultivars of the AB, AAB, and ABB genome groups divided into two groups, and cluster II, which consisted of fifteen cultivars, including all AAA triploids, five AA diploids, and three AAB triploids. According to Euclidean distance metrics, Nendran and Quintal Nendran (AAB) had the most morphological resemblance, whereas Pisanglilin (AA) and Perumpadali (AAB) had the greatest morphological dissimilarity. Cluster analysis based on fifty-one morphological features distinguished cultivars with the acuminata genome alone from cultivars with a hybrid genome composition. The results of PCO analysis using morphological data were similar to those of cluster analysis.
Keywords: Banana, cluster analysis, Kerala, morphological analysis, Musa
|
|
