DUS based morphological evaluation of bell pepper (Capsicum annuum L. var. grossum Sendt.) germplasm for identification of promising breeding lines in Himachal Pradesh, India.

Authors

Gurpreet Kaur, Devinder Kumar Mehta, Anuj Sohi, Nayan Deep, Tarun Kumar Meena

Published in

Journal of applied genetics. Jun 24, 2026. Epub Jun 24, 2026.

Abstract

Bell pepper (Capsicum annuum L. var. grossum Sendt.) is a major Solanaceous vegetable crop exhibiting wide variability in fruit size, shape and colour, which are critical market traits. The present study aimed to evaluate genetic diversity among 34 advanced breeding lines of bell pepper along with two check varieties (California Wonder and Solan Bharpur) using 30 agro-morphological descriptors (13 qualitative and 17 quantitative) under DUS (Distinctness, Uniformity, Stability) guidelines. The experiment was conducted during 2022 and 2023 at Dr YS Parmar University of Horticulture and Forestry, Nauni, Solan, Himachal Pradesh, in a randomized complete block design (RCBD) with three replications. Significant variation was observed across morphological traits, with highest diversity index (H = 1.01) recorded for fruit shape in longitudinal section. Analysis of variance revealed substantial genetic variability and several genotypes (UHF-CAP-108, UHF-CAP-119, IIHR-131, UHF-CAP-106, UHF-CAP-113) significantly outperformed the better check variety Solan Bharpur for fruit yield per plant, producing medium-sized, blocky, glossy, dark green fruits with 3-4 lobes. Principal component analysis (PCA) identified six components explaining 83.08% of total variance, with thousand seed weight, number of lobes per fruit, fruit diameter, fruit weight, internodal length and fruit length as major contributors. Cluster analysis grouped the genotypes into five distinct clusters, with maximum inter-cluster (D² = 9.74) distance observed between cluster III and cluster V, indicating broad genetic diversity. Overall, the study highlights the effectiveness of DUS-based characterization supported by multivariate analysis in identifying promising breeding lines and key traits for future bell pepper improvement programmes.

PMID:
42340593
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 24 Jun 2026.

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