COMBININ ABILITY AND AGRONOMIC POTENTIAL OF MAIZE LINES WITH DIFFERENTE LEVEL OF INBREEDING

Abstract

In the development of inbred maize lines, it is of great importance to determine their combinatory aptitude; therefore, in this study, 15 top-crosses were evaluated in three localities from Morelos, Mexico (P-V 2017); 36 diallelic crosses were evaluated in a single locality (O-I 2018/2018/2019), and 15 inbred lines were evaluated per se (P-V 2018). The objectives were to estimate and select lines with good General Combinatory Aptitude (GCA) through topcrosses testing, to determine if
positive high GCA lines for grain yield form positive high Specific Combinatory Aptitude (SCA) crosses with negative GCA lines, and to evaluate the agronomic potential of lines of different level of inbreeding. The variables studied were male flowering, plant height, weight of 100 kernels, and grain yield. The CML341, CML576 and CML549 lines resulted in positive GCA in topcrosses and diallelic crosses, whereas CML340, CML342, CML341, LUM124 and LUM194 were the highest in grain yield.