STUDIES ON GENETIC DIVERGENCE AMONG FIFTY INDIGENOUS MAIZE (ZEA MAYS L.) INBREDS LINESChethan, K.G and S. NatarajaAbstract In the present experimental work, Fifty Indigenous inbred lines of Maize were evaluated for fourteen characters during Kharif 2018. To study the genetic divergence using Mahalanobis D2 analysis, which revealed that the fifty indigenous inbred lines were grouped into six distinct clusters indicating the presence of diversity. The maximum intra cluster distance was recorded within cluster II, while it was lowest for the genotype of cluster I. The maximum inter cluster distance was observed between clusters IV and VI and the minimum inter cluster distance was observed between cluster IV and V. Parental material selection from these clusters would give high manifestation of heterosis as well as wide spectrum of variation when they are hybridized. |