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Detection of Epistatic, Additive, and Dominance Variation in Winter Wheat ( Triticum aestivum L. em Thell.) 1
Author(s) -
Ketata H.,
Smith E. L.,
Edwards L. H.,
McNew R. W.
Publication year - 1976
Publication title -
crop science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.76
H-Index - 147
eISSN - 1435-0653
pISSN - 0011-183X
DOI - 10.2135/cropsci1976.0011183x001600010001x
Subject(s) - epistasis , biology , cultivar , grain yield , agronomy , gene interaction , dominance (genetics) , poaceae , test weight , gene , botany , horticulture , genetics
The objectives of this study were to determine whether epistasis plays a significant role in the genetic systems for selected traits among several winter wheat ( Triticum aestivum L. em Thell.) cultivars and to evaluate the importance of additive vs. dominance gene action for traits not influenced by epistasis. In each of two replicated experiments, two cultivars (referred to as testers L 1 and L 2 ) and their F 1 (L 3 ) were crossed to each of 10 other cultivars and evaluated in a single field experiment. The deviations (cultivar ✕ L 1 + cultivar ✕ L 2 — 2 cultivar ✕ L 3 ) were analyzed to provide a test for epistasis. An additive‐lominance model was fitted to the data for those characters not affected by gene interactions. Results of the two experiments were generally consistent with respect to the detection of epistasis. Epistasis affected the expression of heading date, kernels/spikelet, and grain yield, but not of plant height, protein content, tiller number, spikelets/spike, and kernels/spike in both experiments. Epistasis was indicated for kernel weight in one experiment but not the other. Expression of epistasis was influenced by particular cultivars, indicating that a limited number of cultivars may not be sufficient to detect nonallelic interactions for a character within this species. Additive gene action was predominant in both experiments for protein content, spikelets/spike, and kernels/spike, suggesting that improvement of those characters can be achieved through standard selection procedures. Evidence for dominance gene action was obtained for plant height and kernels/spike in one experiment. The results of this study indicated that epistasis may be a nontrivial factor in the inheritance of agronomic traits. Genetic models neglecting epistasis may result in biased information.