Assessment of barley genotypes for malting quality: Genotype x environment interactions

Investigating and improving malting quality in barley is long-standing objective worldwide. Genotype by environment interactions (G x E) result inconsistent genotypic performance and obstruct realization of quality traits under varying environments. The present investigation delineated implications of G x E on malting quality parameters studied for 45 genotypes over three years. The combined analysis showed significant G x E interactions (P<0.01) for 1000 grain wt., malt friability and hot water extract (malt extract). The year source of variation highly affected malt extract (82.57%) followed by malt friability (51.82%). Average malt extract was observed higher (81.06%) during the year 2013, which received higher precipitation. The significant G x E were further portrayed into GGE biplots and initial two principal components depicted higher variation of 93.07, 92.00 and 92.45% for 1000 grain wt., malt friability and hot water extract, respectively. Grain protein content revealed negative correlations with malt extract (−0.60**) and malt friability (−0.53**). The exotic genotypes Sloop-VIC-VB9953, Henley and Xanadu exhibited marginal high malting quality but suffered with low grain yield and prolonged maturity.