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Dissecting the dependence of total biomass on physiological traits through path analysis

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Abstract

Water use efficiency (WUE) and total transpiration (T) are the two pivotal traits that determine the differences in total biomass (BM) accumulation. A significant genetic variability in these traits has been demonstrated in several crop species. Exploring of latter traits through breeding efforts to improve crop productivity have been rather slow in rice. To achieve success in crop improvement, it is important to understand the regulation of biomass accumulation by these physiological variables. Plant breeders often resort to the path analysis of the predictor variables and their influence on the response variables. Such analyses though have been extensively studied for yield attributing characteristics, very few studies have been conducted to understand the influence of the physiological traits such as WUE and T on biomass accumulation. Hence, a subset of random 40 Doubled Haploid Lines (DHLs) were examined in rice for the differences in WUE, T and BM. The statistical significance of path analysis indicated that WUE was controlled by the photosynthetic capacity, indicating that high WUE-DHLs would always have high biomass. This was further validated through a positive effect of mean transpiration rate on WUE through net assimilation rate. The outcomes of the current study suggest that the path analysis is a better approach to identify the genotypes with high WUE based on transpiration and photosynthetic rate.

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Abbreviations

BM:

Total biomass

NAR:

Net assimilation rate

MTR:

Mean transpiration rate

T:

Cumulative water transpired

LAD:

Leaf area duration

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Acknowledgements

Authors are humbled and gratefully acknowledge the grants provided by the Department of Science & Technology and Department of Biotechnology, Government of India. The Senior Research Fellowship to Dr. S. Nadaradjan from Indian Council of Agricultural Research is duly acknowledged.

Funding

Department of Biotechnology, New Delhi.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Crop Physiology Unit, Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru College of Agriculture and Research Institute (PAJANCOA&RI), Karaikal, U.T of Puducherry, India

    S. Nadaradjan

  2. Department of Agronomy, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS, USA

    S. M. Impa

  3. Department of Agroforestry, Forest College and Research Institute, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Mettupalayam, 638109, India

    P. Boominathan

  4. Department of Crop Physiology, University of Agricultural Sciences, Gandhi Krishi Vignan Kendra Campus, Bangalore, 560 065, India

    S. Hukkeri, S. G. Parsi, M. S. Sheshshayee, M. Udayakumar & T. G. Prasad

Authors
  1. S. Nadaradjan
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  2. S. M. Impa
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  3. P. Boominathan
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  4. S. Hukkeri
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  5. S. G. Parsi
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  6. M. S. Sheshshayee
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  7. M. Udayakumar
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  8. T. G. Prasad
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Contributions

M. Udayakumar, T.G. Prasad and M.S. Sheshshayee conceptualized and designed the experiments. S. Nadaradjan, S.M. Impa, P. Boominathan and S.G. Parsi performed experiment. Manuscript was drafted by S Nadaradjan, S.M. Impa, Hukkeri and M.S. Sheshshayee.

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Correspondence to S. Nadaradjan.

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Nadaradjan, S., Impa, S.M., Boominathan, P. et al. Dissecting the dependence of total biomass on physiological traits through path analysis. Plant Physiol. Rep. 27, 207–212 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40502-022-00649-w

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