Analysis of Genetic Variability to Improve Yield and Resistance to Bacterial Leaf Blight in Rice (Oryza sativa L) Germplasm

One hundred indigenous collection of rice germplasm were evaluated for ten quantitative traits to assess the genetic variability, heritability, associations and estimation of yield related traits including area under disease progress curve for bacterial leaf blight. was present for all the traits,. In all germplasm, the analysis of variance revealed a wide range of variability and significant differences for the characters under study, indicating the presence of high genetic variability among the genotypes and considerable scope for selection. The estimates of genotypic coefficient of variance were lower than the respective phenotypic coefficient of variance, indicating the influence of environmental factors on the expression of the traits studied. The high heritability was observed for grain yield per plant, thousand grain weight, total spikelets per panicle, number of effective tillers per plant, plant height, grain weight per panicle, days to maturity and days to 50 per cent flowering. The phenotypic correlation coefficients were positive and highly significant between grain yield per plant with days to 50% flowering, days to maturity, total spikelets per panicle, grain weight per panicle and thousand grain weight. The correlation between area under disease progress curve and number of effective tillers per plant and thousand grain weight was positive.