Evaluation of mutagenized lentil populations by caffeine and EMS for exploration of agronomic traits and mutant phenotyping

Abstract

Lentil is a major protein crop, consumed as food across the globe to fulfill protein requirements. Because of increase demand and significant economic importance, its production should increase. In the present investigation, gradual decrease in germination percentage, plant survival and pollen fertility of mutagenic treated population was observed in M 1 generation. Qualitative and quantitative traits were also affected due to mutagenic treatment and the sensitivity was found highest in EMS followed by caffeine. Meiotic studies revealed high frequency of chromosomal aberration in EMS as compared to caffeine. Agronomic trait analysis showed inter and intra treatment phenotypic variations such as plant height, branches per plant and seed yield. Estimation of mutant recovery rate in M 2 generation showed higher recovery in 0.75, 1.0% caffeine and 0.75% EMS followed by 1.0% EMS. In the present examination, phenotypic categories of mutants associated with the vegetative organs (plant size, plant habits, leaf morphology) were dominant representing >60% followed by seed color, size, shape and germination of total phenotypes of both mutagenic M 2 population. A comparative account on number of mutants and phenotype category in M 2 plants showed that pleiotropic mutants were higher than non pleiotropic mutants. The heritability and reproducibility of 29 putative mutants were analyzed in M 3 generation on the basis of observed agro-economical traits which showed 18 complete and 5 partial heritable mutants.