THE PRESENT work was conducted to study the effects of late planting on the performance of Egyptian cottons, sensitivity to environments and gene action controlled earliness, lint yield/plant, lint % and lint index. A half diallel crosses of eight Egyptian cottons varieties were evaluated under normal and late plantings. The reduction % in lint yield/plant was 23.21 and 23.87% for the parents and F1 hybrids; respectively. The results of stress susceptibility index of LY/P indicated that six parents were tolerant for LY/P to late planting. Sixteen out of the 28 hybrids showed tolerance in LY/P to late planting. The diallel analysis revealed significant (p ≤ 0.01) items; ‘’a’’ and ‘’b’’, indicating that both additive and dominance effects of genes were involved in the inheritance of the five studied traits. The genetic parameter indicating that ‘’H1’’ tended to be more than the additive parameter ‘’D’’ under late planting. The regression analysis of Wr/Vr indicated the presence of non-allelic interaction in the inheritance of lint yield/plant under late planting. However, the additive–dominance model was adequate in the inheritance of days to first flower under normal and late plantings. The ‘’b2’’’ item and KD/KR indicated unequal distribution of dominance and recessive genes in the parents for all traits. The non-additive effects of genes were reflected in the departure of narrow form broad sense heritability. Therefore, pedigree and recurrent selection breeding methods could be effective to isolate lines adapted to late planting.

This study examined the relationships of some agronomic traits associated with achene yield and oil content in selected S1 per se families of Giza 102 sunflower cultivar. And to employ the cluster and principle component (PC) analyses to identify and classify superior S1 families based on the genetic distances. The current work was carried out at Shandaweel Agric. Res. St., ARC, Sohag, during two successive summer seasons, 2016 and 2017. 23 S1 per se families and Giza 102 were evaluated for days to 50% flowering (DF), days to maturity (DM), plant height (PH) in cm, stem diameter (SD) in cm, head diameter (HD), 100-seed weight (SI) in g, achene yield per plant (AY) in g plant-1, achene yield per plot (ACP) in g plot -1 and oil content (%). Achene yield/plot showed highest positive correlation coefficients with achene yield/plant followed by seed index, head diameter and stalk diameter at genotypic and phenotypic levels. Three main components (PC1, PC2 and PC3) have been extracted that accounted for 78.65 % of the variability. The portion of each three components was 38.09, 28.23 and 12.33% of total variance, respectively. Achene yield/plant and achene yield/plot have the highest weight in PC1 and S1 families can be grouped by utilizing these two components. Head diameter, SI and SD were associated positively with PC1. Days to flowering, DM and PH were correlated to PC2, while oil content was associated with PC3. The 23 S1 families and Giza 102 were clustered into mainly three clusters. Cluster I was characterized by the highest mean value for achene yield/plot, achene yield/plant, head diameter, stalk diameter and seed index. The research concluded that the S1 families i. e. 15, 9, 5, 18, 14, 22 and 23 could be selected for simultaneous improvement for yield and earliness in sunflower.

Additive main effects and multiplicative interactions (AMMI) model anal-yses were performed to assess and quantify the magnitude of genotype by envi-ronment interaction (GEI) for number of days to heading (DH) and grain yield (GY/P) stability of sixteen promising bread wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) geno-types. Field experiments under recommended (N) and late (L) sowing date in newly reclaimed soil were conducted in the Agricultural Research Station at Ar-ab-Elawamer, Assiut, Egypt for three consecutive seasons (2016/2017, 2017/2018 and 2018/2019). The combined ANOVA showed highly significant differences among genotypes and among environments for both traits, while GEI was highly significant for DH and not significant for GY/P. Results of AMMI analysis indicated that the first three AMMI (PC1, PC2 and PC3) were highly significant for DH and AMMI1 was only significant in case of GY/P. In addition, the environments showed high contributions to the total sum of squares (TSS) and explained 84.7 and 85.3% for days to heading and grain yield/plot, respec-tively. While, the genotypes captured 10.4 and 6.8% of the TSS for the same traits, respectively. Although that the GEI showed low contribution to the total SS, but its magnitude (7.9%) was larger than that for genotypes in case of GY/P. The AMMI stability value discriminated genotypes G3, G7, G9, G12 and G14. G3 were the most promising stable and adapted genotypes according to grain yield performance over environments.

Soil salinity is one of the serious abiotic stresses adversely affects crop production. The objectives of this study were to screen fifteen long-staple cotton belong to Gossypium barbadense L. for salinity tolerance, salinity indices, genotypic correlations, and path-coefficient analysis. Under normal soil the genotypes differed significantly in most traits in both years. Under saline soil the differences among genotypes re significant in one year and in the combined analysis for SCY/P, LY/P, SI, NS/B, PH, and Pressley index. The cultivars “G 90 x Aus”, G95, G 90, G 80, and G 83 showed the highest performance in SCY/P, LY/P, Lint%, NB/P and NS/B either under normal or saline soil. The reduction% caused by salinity was observed for PH (55.92%), LY/P (52.21%), SCY/P (48 75%), NB/P (32.47%), LI (5.68%), Micronaire reading (11.22%), Pressley index (6.63%) and UHM length (0.89%). Giz90 x Aus followed by Giza 90 showed the best tolerance to salinity stress. The STI, MP, GMP, HM and DI detected both of tolerant and susceptible genotypes and could be considered the best tolerant indices. The direct and indirect effects of SCY/P components varied greatly under both environments. The direct effects of the SCY/P components under normal soil were 0.504, 0.401, 0.153 and 0.147 for NB/P, LY/P, SI, and NS/B, respectively. However, under saline soil the direct effects were 0.802, 0.178, 0.128 and 0.050 for LY/P, NB/P, NS/B and SI, respectively. Therefore, under both environments, selection should be paid mainly on NB/P and LY/P.

Fusarium is one of the most dangerous fungal diseases that cause great loss of the sesame yield worldwide. The
present work aimed to improve tolerance and/or resistance to Fusarium through two cycles of pedigree selection on sesame population for eight selection criteria started in the F3-generation. Genotypic coefficient of variability in the F3 varied from 4.34% for days to 50% flowering to 38.15% for seed yield (SY/P). Days to 50% flowering showed negative correlations with all traits except height to first capsule (HFC). Height to first capsule was negatively correlated with length of fruiting zone (LFZ), 1000-SW, oil% and infection%, and positively correlated with capsules/plant (NC/P) and SY/P. Single trait selection was an efficient method to improve selection criterion, but it caused adverse effects on some correlated traits. Selection for days to 50% flowering improved earliness, but it was better in improving yield if the selection was restricted by SY/P. Selection for oil% restricted by yield was better in improving yield than selection for oil% per se. Therefore, the inclusion of a trait as independent culling level improved the efficiency of selection. The best genetic gain in SY/P in percentage from the mid-parent was obtained from selection for days to 50% flowering restricted by SY/P (35.56**), LFZ restricted by HFC (19.53**), days to 50% flowering (19.32**), oil% restricted by SY/P (19.02**), SY/P (17.38**), 1000 SW (14.09**) and LFZ (14.032**). Therefore, selection index incorporating favorable trait is recommended.

Background and Objective: Wheat plants exposed to heat stress due to late sowing often leads to great yield loss. Genotype×Environment interaction (GGE) biplot approach is a powerful tool for graphical multi-environment trials data analysis. The main objective of this investigation was to identify high yielding and stable genotypes of wheat under late sowing date over a range of environmental conditions in Egypt through GGE-biplot analysis. Materials and Methods: We investigated grain yield t haG1 and its attributes of forty-nine CIMMYT’s lines along with three local cultivars of bread wheat at two locations in two sowing dates and over two consecutive years (8 environments). Results: Highly significant variations were obtained for all investigated traits among all sources of
variation. Since the environment was the main source of variation. Maximum reduction percentage due to late sowing date was observed for grain yield t haG1 in both locations and this may be because of high temperature and short grains filling duration. The GGE biplot method revealed that L33, L40 and L44 were the highest yielding genotypes at the Assiut location. Genotypes L8, L9 and L42 were the superior yielding entries at Nubariah location environments. Conclusion: L30, L32, L37, L21, L27 and L33 were the most stable entries as they were subtended by relatively low PC2 scores. The results of GGE and STI indicated that L28 and L33 gave high grain yield with superior stability and could be considered as the most suitable genotype for late sowing.

Background and Objective: Late sowing of wheat exposes the anthesis and grain filling stages of the crop to a terminal heat temperature stress Therefore, detecting putative QTL associated with grain yield and its attributes and identifying the most tolerant genotypes to terminal drought and heat stress across environments will be beneficial in wheat breeding programs. Materials and Methods: In the present study, among 49 CIMMYT wheat lines evaluated for yield and stability in eight environments, we selected the highest ten high-yielding (HYL) and the lowest ten low yielding lines (LYL) along with three wheat check cultivars (CC) for screening with eighteen
previously published SSR molecular markers associated with drought and heat stress tolerance. Results: Two SSR markers (BARC126 and BARC11) on 7D were associated with delay heading dates under normal and late sowing dates. Likewise, the SSR markers WMC396, GWM537 and XGWM577 which were mapped on 7B, were significantly linked with grain yield-related traits under one/or both sowing dates, most of them showed desirable effects, indicating terminal heat stress tolerance. Different SSR markers viz., BARC11, XGWM132 and GWM537 showed pleiotropic effects. Conclusion: The SSR markers BARC186-5A, XGWM132-6B, WMC396-7B, GWM577-7B and GWM165-4B were more prominently associated with heat tolerance by showing a desirable performance of grain yield-related traits under late sowing or across environments, some of these desirable alleles were corresponding to previously QTL in various genotypes that could be valuable in breeding for high-yield in wheat.

Increased salinity is one of the major consequences of climatic change affecting global
crop production. The early stages in the barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) life cycle are considered the
most critical phases due to their contributions to final crop yield. Particularly, the germination and
seedling development are sensitive to numerous environmental stresses, especially soil salinity. In
this study, we aimed to identify SNP markers linked with germination and seedling development
at 150 mM NaCl as a salinity treatment. We performed a genome-wide association study (GWAS)
using a panel of 208 intermedium-spike barley (H. vulgare convar. intermedium (Körn.) Mansf.)
accessions and their genotype data (i.e., 10,323 SNPs) using the genome reference sequence of
“Morex”. The phenotypic results showed that the 150 mM NaCl salinity treatment significantly
reduced all recorded germination and seedling-related traits compared to the control treatment.
Furthermore, six accessions (HOR 11747, HOR 11718, HOR 11640, HOR 11256, HOR 11275 and
HOR 11291) were identified as the most salinity tolerant from the intermedium-spike barley collection.
GWAS analysis indicated that a total of 38 highly significantly associated SNP markers under control
and/or salinity traits were identified. Of these, two SNP markers on chromosome (chr) 1H, two
on chr 3H, and one on chr 4H were significantly linked to seedling fresh and dry weight under
salinity stress treatment. In addition, two SNP markers on chr 7H were also significantly associated
with seedling fresh and dry weight but under control condition. Under salinity stress, one SNP
marker on chr 1H, 5H and 7H were detected for more than one phenotypic trait. We found that in
most of the accessions exhibiting the highest salinity tolerance, most of the salinity-related QTLs
were presented. These results form the basis for detailed studies, leading to improved salt tolerance
breeding programs in barley.