Utilization of Intra-Cultivar Variation for Grain Yield and Protein Content within Durum Wheat Cultivars

Elissavet Ninou, Ioannis Mylonas, Ioulia Karagianni, Sonia Michailidou, Athanasios Tsivelikas, Iosif Sistanis, Ilias Avdikos, Evangelos Korpetis and Fokion Papathanasiou
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Elissavet Ninou: Department of Agriculture, International Hellenic University, Sindos, 57400 Thessaloniki, Greece
Ioannis Mylonas: Hellenic Agricultural Organization-Dimitra, Institute of Plant Breeding and Genetic Resources, Thermi, 57001 Thessaloniki, Greece
Ioulia Karagianni: Department of Agriculture, University of Western Macedonia, 53100 Florina, Greece
Sonia Michailidou: Department of Agriculture, University of Western Macedonia, 53100 Florina, Greece
Athanasios Tsivelikas: International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA), Al-Irfane, Rabat 10090, Morocco
Iosif Sistanis: Department of Agriculture, University of Western Macedonia, 53100 Florina, Greece
Ilias Avdikos: Department of Agriculture, International Hellenic University, Sindos, 57400 Thessaloniki, Greece
Evangelos Korpetis: Hellenic Agricultural Organization-Dimitra, Institute of Plant Breeding and Genetic Resources, Thermi, 57001 Thessaloniki, Greece
Fokion Papathanasiou: Department of Agriculture, University of Western Macedonia, 53100 Florina, Greece

Agriculture, 2022, vol. 12, issue 5, 1-15

Abstract: This study assessed the variations in grain yield (GY) and protein content (PC) within two commercial durum wheat cultivars (Svevo and Maestrale) and evaluated their responses to intra-cultivar selection for both traits. We investigated whether the variations are exploitable and could result in concurrent GY and PC upgrading. The experiments were conducted in the IPBGR, Thessaloniki, Greece (2018–2020). The first year included two identical honeycomb design trials under ultra-low plant density (ULD) where the divergent selection was applied based on single plant yield and protein content. In the second year, progeny evaluation under typical crop density (TCD) for GY and PC occurred in a randomized complete block (RCB) and with three replications for each cultivar selected line. This revealed considerable variation within already improved commercial cultivars. Single-plant selection for GY and PC simultaneously resulted in: (a) one high-yielding line that significantly outperformed the original cultivar Svevo while maintaining high PC, and (b) two high-grain PC lines that outperformed the original cultivar Maestrale significantly while maintaining high GY. ULD allowed efficient selection for GY and PC simultaneously within narrow gene pools by maximizing phenotypic expression and differentiation among individual plants.

Keywords: grain yield; protein content; variability; field evaluation; density (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q1 Q10 Q11 Q12 Q13 Q14 Q15 Q16 Q17 Q18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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