Trait patterns of mungbean, black gram and rice bean

Food legumes like mungbean (Vigna radiata var. radiata), black gram (Vigna mungo), and rice bean (Vigna umbellata) have potential to diversify diets and agro-ecosystems of the tropics. Access to genetic diversity and phenotypic data are key issues for crop improvement. Large germplasm collections like the one at the World Vegetable Center may be used in detecting trait relationships and to identify accessions of interest for breeding. The current study provides results of more than 30 years of field characterization, including 9 numeric and 15 categorical descriptors and more than 10, 000 accessions or sub-accessions. Core collections were established in black gram and rice bean. A positive correlation was detected between yield components such as seed size and pod length, and between these yield components and less desirable traits such as plant height and late maturity. High within-accession diversity was identified in several of the accessions.