Characterization of EMS Induced Putative Kinnow Mandarin Mutants for Growth, Yield and Quality Traits

Abstract

In the present study, twenty putative bearing mutants of Kinnow mandarin developed from different oncentration (0.05%, 0.1%, 0.2% and 0.5%) of ethyl methanesulfonate (EMS) were evaluated for phenological, yield and quality traits and compared with the wild type (WT). Plant height as compared to WT was stimulated by almost 10% in the mutants E-2 and E-5 developed from the lower doses of 0.05% EMS, while it was curtailed by 25% in the mutants E-16 and E-17 developed from higher dosimetry of 0.5% EMS. The inhibited plant however, did not affect the fruiting intensity. A dose-dependent decrease in fruit weight varying from 22.04 to 41.50% was noticed in the mutants between E-1 (0.05%) to E-15 (0.2%). Mutants E-1 and E-16 developed from the two contrasting doses of EMS had fruits with thicker peel similar to WT. The number of seeds/fruit was significantly reduced in the putative mutants E-16 and E-19 (<15.0 seeds/fruit) as compared to WT which had almost 32.0 seeds/fruit. The juice recovery per cent was however, slightly lower in the EMS induced mutants. This mutagenic approach has led to the identification of mutant with positive traits such as diminutive plants coupled with higher fruiting intensity and lower number of seeds per fruit.