Summary
In plant breeding yield trials the environmental range often exceeds the genotypic range. In such instances environmental main-effects (mean yields) may confound characterization of selection environments, as the general productivity of an environment may be unrelated to tendencies in the relative performance (ranking) of genetic material grown in that environment.
This paper assesses methods for removing environmental main-effects to provide environmental descriptions with direct relevance to selection and evaluation in plant breeding. Relationships between environments using squared Euclidean distances based on raw, coded, ratio, and standardized data were compared with a rank change measure. The associated results of pattern analyses using the four differently calculated measures of squared Euclidean distance were also compared.
Standardization, giving each environment a mean of zero and a unit phenotypic standard deviation, was found to be the most suitable data transformation from theoretical considerations and in practice. Irrespective of environmental mean yield levels, standardized analyses result in the association of environments which rank lines similarly (and so provide similar selection information).
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Fox, P.N., Rosielle, A.A. Reducing the influence of environmental main-effects on pattern analysis of plant breeding environments. Euphytica 31, 645–656 (1982). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00039203
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00039203