Epistasis in an Andean x Mesoamerican cross of common bean

Abstract

The objective of this investigation was to check if epistasis is present in Andean 9 Mesoamerican beans crosses using triple test cross (TTC) method. The parents of the segregating population were Carioca–MG (Mesoamerican) and BRS Radiante (Andean). In July 2005, F2 progenies (backcrossed with the parents and F1 generation) were evaluated at two locations for three characters: number of pods plant-1 , number of grains plant-1 and grain weight plant-1 . The presence of epistasis was detected for all yield components. In the partitioning of epistasis in additive x additive (i) and dominant x dominant (j) and dominant 9 additive (l) it was observed that, for the traits number of pods/plant and number of grains/plant, only epistasis of the type (j) ? (l) were significant. For the trait grain mass/plant, all types of epistasis were significant.