Genetic divergence and hybrid performance in mung bean.

Genetic divergence in 35 populations (10 parents and 25 F1's) of mung bean was studied by D(2) and canonical analyses. The ten parents formed as many as eight separate clusters, suggesting that the genetic divergence between them was quite substantial. The parent BR-2 was highly divergent from all the other entries. It was found that flowering time, maturity, seed density and seed size (100-seed weight) contributed substantially to the divergence. Canonical analysis supported the divergence pattern obtained by D(2) analysis and the contribution of different characters to genetic divergence. The relationship between genetic divergence (D(2)) and heterosis was evaluated. In general, there was fair agreement between the extent of heterosis and the genetic divergence between the parents.