Multivariate analysis of morpho-physiological traits in bread wheat genotypes under terminal heat stress

Abstract

Terminal heat stress has great impact on the quantity and quality of bread wheat that ultimately pose a serious concern about the food security. The presence of the genetic variability and suitable selection criteria is imperative for screening of genotypes for heat tolerance. Therefore, 60 advanced breeding lines and four standard checks were evaluated for morpho-physiological traits under late sown condition to understand the importance of the principal component analysis in reduction of the large correlated data into few major principal components that account for maximum genetic variability. Out of twenty principal components, only three were retained having 67.10% contribution towards total variability on the basis of eigen values and scree plot. Grain yield (0.995), days to heading (0.912) and plant height (0.752) were having maximum positive loading in the first, second and third principal component respectively. Therefore, principal component analysis holds great promise in the crop improvement programme.

Keywords

• terminal heat stress
• wheat
• genetic variability
• principal component and scree plot