Skip to main content
ARS Home » Pacific West Area » Logan, Utah » Forage and Range Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #227729
Title: One Cycle of Phenotypic Selection Combined with Marker Assisted Selection for Improving Yield and Quality in Cucumber

Author
item BEHERA, TUSAR - INDIAN AGRICULTURAL RES
item Staub, Jack
item BEHERA, SNIGDHA - INDIAN AGRICULTURAL RES
item MASON, SHANNA - UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN

Submitted to: Cucurbitaceae Proceedings
Publication Type: Proceedings
Publication Acceptance Date: 6/20/2008
Publication Date: 6/28/2008
Citation: Behera, T.K., Staub, J.E., Behera, S., Mason, S. 2008. One Cycle of Phenotypic Selection Combined with Marker Assisted Selection for Improving Yield and Quality in Cucumber. Cucurbitaceae Proceedings.

Interpretive Summary: Traditional plant breeding can be enhanced by the use of modern biotechnologies. One such biotechnology is called marker-assisted selection (MAS). MAS is a technology that uses information at the gene level (genes are units of information that carry hereditary information that are on chromosomes which are all cells). MAS can be used to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of traditional plant breeding because many more plants can be examined and thus there is a greater opportunity to identify unique plants. MAS has been used successfully in cucumber to improve yield. However, the effectiveness of MAS has not been documented for its use and potential value for improving fruit quality. Thus, an experiment was designed in cucumber to examine the effectiveness and efficiency of MAS for selection of both yield and quality. It was determined that MAS was ineffective for increasing breeding of fruit quality in cucumber. This information can be used by public and private breeders as they assess their investment of MAS in cucumber for yield and quality. They can freely use MAS for increasing yield and concomittently use tradition breeding procedures for improvement of fruit quality. This will allow them to provide U.S. growers with improved cultivars more rapidly and thus improve their global competitiveness.

Technical Abstract: Estimation of response to marker-assisted selection (MAS) is critical to breeding programs. To investigate MAS for line development, two cucumber recombinant inbred lines (RILs) (7026B76 and 7022C8) differing in plant habit were mated, and F4 and F5 progeny was MAS selected to improve both yield and quality. The broad-sense heritability (h2B) ranged from 0.22 to 0.45 for yield (fruits per plant), and from 0.09 to 0.20 for fruit length:diameter ratio (L:D). Selection was effective in maintaining in phenotypic performance in F4 progeny, but not after advanced generation (F5) progeny selection (i.e., yield decrease with maintenance of fruit quality). The lack of response may be due to low trait heritability.