Assessment of waterlogging tolerance in mungbean genotypes utilizing morphological traits and SSR markers

Abstract

Some promising mungbean genotypes were employed to evaluate waterlogging tolerance and molecular characterization using SSR marker. Waterlogging treatment was applied to 25-d old plants maintaining 2-3 cm waterlogging depth for three days with extended seven days saturation period. It significantly reduced the growth and yield but the plants remarkably improved their depressed characters during the recovery period. The early response of waterlogging was the development of adventitious roots which is an important adaptive mechanism of plants under waterlogged situations. Based on waterlogging tolerance index calculated as the percent ratio of relative growth rate (RGR) in waterlogged plants and RGR in non-waterlogged plants of all plant components, the genotypes ACC12890054 and BUmug 4 appeared as the most tolerant to waterlogging. The genotypes ACC12890085 and ACC 12890054 that showed better tolerance to waterlogging gave the highest relative yield of 46% followed by BUmug 4 and VC 6173-A genotypes. Based on the correlation coefficient and relative values, the genotypes were grouped into four clusters using K-means cluster analysis. In SSR analysis, PIC values of the markers were above or almost equal to 0.5 indicating the used primers were effective to differentiate the genotypes at the molecular level. In analysis 16 pairs of mungbean genotypes showed 41.7% maximum dissimilarity. We grouped 12 genotypes into four clusters using unweighted pair group method with arithmetic mean (UPGMA). These four main clusters are distinctly dissimilar to each other on the based of genetic characters. Thus, the findings of this research could be used for envisaging promising mungbean genotypes and developing waterlogged-tolerant mungbean variety(s).