Characterization of Buckwheat Cultivars Using Morphological, Chemical, Physiological and Biochemical Parameters

摘要

Variety identification has great significance from seed production, breeding as well as intellectual property rights point of view. Investigations were carried out under field and laboratory conditions to characterize 12 buckwheat varieties/genotypesbelonging to both F. tsculentum and tataricum groups using seed, seedling and adult plant morphological; chemical, physiological and biochemical (SDS-PAGE) parameters. Morphological parameters of the seed viz. seed coat colour and seed shape, and of theadult plant viz. flowering time, leaf shape, petiole colour, plant height and cyme length were effective in identifying buckwheat genotypes. Among the physiological parameters chlorophyll content, electrical conductivity of seed and leaf, total sugar content; photosynthesis and stomatal conductance were important in identifying the varieties Sangla BI, Shimla BI and Sangla Bg. Among the chemical parameters phenol colour reaction and NaOH bleach test were effective in characterizing Sangla B_2, Shimla B_2 and P B-1 while peroxidase test was not found to be as effective. Parameters related to seed vigour were not able to classify the genotypes into distinct groups. Soluble seed proteins of the 12 genotypes were studied using denaturating SDS-PAGE and variation was observed in the banding pattern. Cluster analysis based on UPGMA utilizing Squared Euclidean Distances (SED) classified the genotype in two broad groups. Dendrogram derived from SDS-PAGE profile revealed that Himpriya and Sangla Be did not exhibit any significant variation while KBB-3 emerged as a separate group. The study brought out the importance of using combination of morphological, chemical, physiological and biochemical parameters for unambiguous characterization of buckwheat genotypes/varieties rather than a single set of parameters alone.