EVALUATION OF VARIOUS COTTON GENOTYPES THROUGH GENETIC DIVERSITY ANALYSIS

Fifty-two varieties/strains of cotton were studied to explore the genetic divergence in the yield trials at Cotton Research Station, Faisalabad. The study aimed to identify strains with earliness, CLCuD tolerance, and superior yield with better fiber quality. Correlation analysis showed significant positive association of seed cotton yield (SCY) with boll number, boll weight(g), ginning out turn (GOT) and fiber length, while significant negative association with leaf curl disease and first flower appearance date was observed. Principal components analysis revealed that four out of 11 principal component showed Eigen value ˃1. The contribution of these PCs towards total variability was 76.8% with PC-1 with maximum (44.4%), followed by PC-2 (12.2%), PC-3 (10.9 %) and PC-4 (9.3%). Traits including yield, bolls number, boll weight and plant height exhibited noteworthy positive factor loading in PC-1, while cotton leaf curl virus, days to first boll opening and first flower had maximum negative loadings. The findings of cluster analysis indicated that the genotypes present in cluster V (FH-1131, FH-1133, FH-1214, FH-525, FH-453, FH-333, FH-1132, FH-1135, FH-416, FH-1134 and FH-938) have excellent combination of all desirable traits viz., earliness, fiber quality, seed cotton yield (SCY) and its contributing traits. As apparent from the results of cluster and principal components analyses, topmost genotypes based on genetic divergence data may also be tested in provincial and national yield trials because they have combination of better yield and quality parameters.