QTL MAPPING OF "A-GENOME" FOR INTERSPECIFIC POPULATION OF GOSSYPIUM HIRSUTUM AND GOSSYPIUM ARBOREUM

Cotton production in Pakistan is vital for economic development of the country. It contributes around 0.6 percent to GDP and 3.1 percent of the value added in agriculture for the year 2020. Similarly, it earned 61.5% of the foreign exchange for the country in the year 2006 and have fallen to 51% in 2018. Thus, it needs to utilize molecular tools for the enhancement of seed cototn yield and use of QTL (Quantitative trait loci) for improvemetn of crops yield is well documented. Thus the plant materials used in this study was 280 individual progenies of BC4F2 mapping population raised from cross between G. hirsutum and G. arboreum. These backcross progenies were manually planted in 450 cm rows for each genotype during 2013 similar to 2014 in China at Jiangpu Farm Nanjing and a total of 8488 simple sequence repeat markers (SSRs) were employed on this BC4F2 population. The results showed that 2056 SSRmarkers were found to be polymorphic with 83% dominant and 17 % codominant Total 26 QTLs were detected for twelve different traits on various chromosomes. Five QTLs (Quantitative trait loci) were recognized for seed cotton yield on chromosome number 1, 5, 9, 11 and 12, showing PVE of 3.8 to 9.1%. SSR markers such as BNL3347, BNL140, GH594, GH100, NAU462, NAU650, NAU2508, NAU150, NAU3401 and NAU-400 would be helpul in Marker Assisted selection. Identified QTLs can prove to be expedient for identification of right progenies in cotton breeding program including gene mapping.