Vol. 10, Issue 8 (2021)

Author(s):
S Venugopal, M Padma, M Rajkumar, N Seenivasan, P Saidaiah and G Sathish

Abstract:
The experiment was laid out in a completely Randomized Block Design with 29 ashwagandha accessions as treatments during Kharif, 2018 at Medicinal and Aromatic Plant Research Station, Sri Konda Laxman Telangana State Horticultural University, Rajendranagar, Hyderabad. Each treatment was randomly replicated thrice. All the germplasm lines were evaluated systematically for grouping them into different clusters using Mahalanobis D² statistical analysis. The results indicated highly significant difference among the genotypes and these genotypes were classified into 12 clusters. Cluster I is the largest group comprising of 9 genotypes followed by cluster II with 8 genotypes, cluster VII with 3 genotypes, whereas clusters III, IV, V, VI, VIII, IX, X, XI and XII were monotypic or solitary. The intra cluster distance varied from 0.0 to 2326.3. Cluster VII recorded maximum D² value (2326.3) followed by cluster II (1546.1) and cluster I (1248.2). Intra cluster distances were not observed in cluster III, IV, V, VI, VIII, IX, X, XI and XII. The inter cluster D² values revealed that the highest inter cluster distance (23780.9) was between cluster VII and XII, while the lowest (1189.3) was between cluster IV and V. The inter cluster distance was minimum between cluster IV and V (1189.3) indicating narrow genetic diversity, whereas the inter cluster distance was maximum between VII and XII (23780.9) followed by VI and XII (22140.8) indicating wider genetic diversity between these groups. Selection of parents from these diverse clusters for hybridization would help in achieving novel recombinants. Maximum mean value for dry leaf weight per plant was recorded in cluster IX (67.32 g) followed by cluster V (41.56 g). The highest dry root weight per plant recorded in the genotypes of cluster IX (13.78 g) followed by cluster VIII (9.81 q), while genotypes of clusters III (0.90g) recorded the lowest dry root weight per plant. The highest alkaloid was noticed in cluster VII (0.39) followed by cluster IX (0.34) and the lowest alkaloid was recorded in the genotypes of cluster X (0.20). The wide range of mean values among the clusters and the characters studied indicates the presence of wide variation among the genotypes studied.