Short Communications Morphological and molecular descriptors for first Indian mustard hybrid, NRCHB 506

Characterization of the first Indian mustard hybrid, NRCHB 506 and its parental lines MJA 5 and MJR 1 had been carried out using morphological traits and molecular markers. Hybrid and its parents expressed distinctness for five morphological traits. Hybrid NRCHB 506 could be distinguished from MJA 5 on the basis of number of seeds/siliqua; being very few (13-≤16) in MJA 5 but medium (17-≤20) in the hybrid. The hybrid NRCHB 506 was alike MJA 5 for remaining four characteristics, namely, number of lobes in leaf, width of petals in flower, plant height and 1000-seed wt; while it was distinct from MJR 1 for these four traits,. During molecular characterization studies, 255 SSR markers, derived from Brassica rapa, B. nigra, B. napus, B. carinata, B. oleracea and Arabidopsis thaliana, were used. Finally, for genetic analysis, two SSR markers, viz., SJ-34121 and Ni4G06, were found to be the most suitable for hybridity confirmation and purity assessment of hybrid seeds. Marker SJ-34121 identified male specific 330 bp repeat and female specific 270 bp repeat; while Ni4G06 also detected one male and one female specific repeat of 110 and 165 bp, respectively in the hybrid.