Field corn inbreds to improve sweet corn hybrids for early vigor and adaptation to european conditions

Sweet corn (Zea mays L.) has a poor adaptation to areas with short growing seasons and cool humid springs, such as the European Atlantic coast. Field corn inbreds adapted to the European Atlantic coast could improve the adaptation of sweet corn to these conditions. Our objectives were to identify fi...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Malvar Pintos, Rosa Ana, Revilla Temiño, Pedro, Cartea González, María Elena, Ordás Pérez, Amando
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Fecha de publicación:1997
País:España
Institución:Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC)
Repositorio:DIGITAL.CSIC. Repositorio Institucional del CSIC
OAI Identifier:oai:digital.csic.es:10261/42763
Acceso en línea:http://hdl.handle.net/10261/42763
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Maize
Sweet corn
Early vigor
Adaptation
Descripción
Sumario:Sweet corn (Zea mays L.) has a poor adaptation to areas with short growing seasons and cool humid springs, such as the European Atlantic coast. Field corn inbreds adapted to the European Atlantic coast could improve the adaptation of sweet corn to these conditions. Our objectives were to identify field corn inbreds as potentials donors of early vigor and adaptation to the European Atlantic coast, and to provide additional information on the relationships among different estimators of favorable alleles for adaptation traits. Eleven European and American field corn inbreds adapted to Northwestern Spain, were crossed to seven sweet corn inbreds that were parents of seven sweet corn hybrids. The inbreds and the crosses field x sweet corn were evaluated separately in field trials at two locations in Northwestern Spain in 1993 and 1994. Early vigor and four agronomic traits were recorded. Estimates of relative number of alleles at six classes of loci (B, C, D, E, F and G), and six methods for identifying field corn inbreds with favorable alleles were computed, namely an estimate of favorable dominant alleles present in the donor but not in the hybrid (µG'), predicted three-way cross (PTC), minimum upper bound (UBND), net improvement (NI), probability of net gain of favorable alleles given complete dominance (PNGg) and given partial dominance or complementary epistasis (PNGceg) and general combining ability (GCA) effects. Correlations between µG', UBND, PTC, NI, and GCA were high for all traits. Some of the estimators were not possibly calculated presumably due to fails on the assumptions of the model. PTC, which was highly correlated with most of the other estimators, may be biased by fails on the assumptions of the model also. However, PTC can be calculated irrespectively of the presumably fails of the assumptions of the model used for estimating favorable alleles. The European flint inbred EP42 was identified by all methods as the best source of early vigor and adaptation for improving sweet corn hybrids. Adult vigor was not clearly related with early vigor. The best source for improving adult vigor was the American dent inbred EP29. European flint inbreds could improve early vigor and adaptation of sweet corn for European conditions.