CHARACTERIZATION OF WHEAT GERMPLASM WITH SEED QUALITY PARAMETERS AND GLUTENIN SUBUNITS

Wheat as the most important staple cereal crop of Pakistan cultivated for daily consumption and industrial uses is mostly associated with the composition of gluten proteins, which is the quality of its end-use. This paper reports the results of our research endeavor where 40 wheat genotypes collected from the core germplasm collection of CCRI (The Cereal Crops Research Institute, Pirsabak), were evaluated for seed quality parameters, variation in one high molecular weight (HMW) and two low molecular weight (LMW) glutenin subunits (GS) and association between the seed quality and HMW-GluB1 locus. Our results revealed that the average Total Grain Protein (TGP) content of all the genotypes was 16.5% (ranging from 11.3 to 20.8%), the Glutenin and Gliadins constituents were 23.6% (ranging from 13.30-31.63%) and 17.5% (ranging from 14.95-19.16%) of the TGP. The variable concentration of the gluten protein resulted in Gli/Glu ratio in a range of 0.5 to 1.39. Furthermore, the By9 allele of HMW-GluB1 locus occurred at a frequency of 0.5 and the LMW-GS alleles GluA3e and GluB3i at 0.3 and 0.48. The absence of By9 allele of HMW-GluB1 locus resulted in a significant decrease in the TGP, Glutenin and gliadins content and an increase in the Gli/Glu ratio. TGP was found to be statistically and most strongly associated with the By9 allele of HMW-GluB1 locus. These findings provide a baseline for molecular markers assisted breeding and gene pyramiding for improving wheat varieties.