Efficiency of Early Generation Selection for Induced Polygenic Mutations in Lentil (Lens Culinaris Medik.)

The mutagenized populations exhibited increased variability over the control in M₂ and M₃ generations for flowering duration, primary branches/plant, peduncles/plant, pods/plant, seeds/pod, 1000-seed weight, and seed yield/plant. The interfamily analysis revealed a great deal of heterogeneity among M₂ families in each treated population with respect to character means. Using CV and mean as parameters, promising M₂ families were identified for multiple characters. The frequency of such promising families with different mutagens was in the following order: NEU≥EMS≥SA≥gamma rays. Most of the M, families (75.0–85.7%) confirmed as promising for multiple characters were already identified in M₂, and some (4.6–7.2%) were isolated from the unselected group of M₂ generation. Although the contribution of the unselected M₂ progenies to the total promising M₃ families was greater (51.3–65.2%) than those obtained from the M₂ selected group (34.7–48.6%), the selection efficiency (proportion of desirable mutations selected), nevertheless, was higher in M₂ than in M₃ generation. About 75–85% selected M₂ plants from various treatments bred true in M₃ for the characters studied. The selection, started in early generation (M₂), can greatly increase the efficiency of mutation breeding for quantitatively inherited traits, such as, yield and maturity.