Multi-environmental evaluation of wheat tetraploid genotypes for agronomic traits under rainfed conditions in Syria

This study was conducted at Homs, Al-Swaida and Tartous, General Commission for Scientific Agricultural Research, Syria during 2016/2017 season. Seven wheat genotypes were planted under rainfed conditions in randomized complete block design with three replications. Studied traits were days to maturity, plant height, number of grain per spike, grain weight per spike, 1000 kernal weight and grain yield per plant to evaluate variance between genotypes and locations. Results showed existence of high variance between studied genotypes in all traits especially plant height. It resulted that genotype W45193 was significantly superior in grain yield per plant with an increasing rate of 69.62% comparing to control Sham 5. Also, it was significantly superior in spike numbers with an increasing rate of 53.53%, 57.24% compared to both controls Sham 3 and Sham 5, respectively. Genotype W45064 was significantly superior in grain weight per spike and 1000 kernal weight compare to both controls Sham 3 and Sham 5. W 45194 was significantly superior in 1000 kernal weight comparing to control Sham 5 (36.34, 31.16 g), respectively. Furthermore, all studied traits (except spike number per plant) were more significant in Tartous compare to both Homs and Al-Swaida

Diversity analysis and structural modeling for some traits in wheat genotypes

This investigation was carried out during 2018/2019 season in three locations Homs, Al-Swaida and Tartous belongs to the General Commission for Scientific Agricultural Research in Syria, using 17 Italian, Syrian and Ethiopian wheat genotypes to estimate the potential diversity by principle component and cluster analysis, and to study the structural modeling between grain yield and other traits to define best traits as predictors and selection indexes of grain yield, and to determine the superior genotypes in grain yield. Results indicated a remarkable variation of 74% due only to the first four principle components with Eigen value > 1. PC Biplot showed that Tartous was the best location, and the genotype SD09 was superior in grain yield per plant followed by SH5 and IP39. Structural modeling results revealed that the total and fertile tillers number per plant were the best predictors for grain yield per plant, while fertile tillers per plant with grain weight per spike could be used as selection indexes of wheat grain yield because they had positive strong direct effect on grain yield per plant. Cluster analysis results confirmed the need to assess more various genotypes from different origins