The Inheritance Pattern of Key Desirable Agronomic and Fruit Quality Traits in Elite Red Papaya Genotypes

Abstract

Knowledge of the heritability, genetic advance, and stability of key traits, such as the height to the first fruit, trunk circumference, number of marketable fruit, wasted fruit, fruit weight, fruit width, fruit length, flesh thickness, cavity width, cavity length, and soluble solid contents, is required. These were determined in ten advanced generation red papaya recombinant inbred lines (RIL; F5 generation). The F5 RIL were grown in four field sites, two each within two distinct agroecological climates: the Tablelands and Coastal regions. At each site, biological replicates (trees) of each RIL and the industry-standard red papaya cultivar, RB1, were grown. Agronomic traits and fruit-specific traits were assessed at five and 10 months, respectively, after seedling transplantation to the field. Height to first fruit, trunk circumference, fruit weight, and soluble solid contents were highly heritable and stable at all field sites (h2b.s, 0.7–0.9) with genetic gains of almost 18% observed for height to first fruit and fruit weight. Across all sites, the trunks of the F5 lines were 37% wider, the trees set fruit 47% closer to the ground and had 20% more marketable fruit with 33% smaller fruit cavity widths, and their fruit was 11% heavier and 12% sweeter than RB1.