Inheritance of physico-chemical seed characters related to culinary quality in dry bean

Culinary quality in dry bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) depends on attributes of seeds prevailing at harvest and is determined by the genetic architecture of cultivars and by unpredictable environmental factors. Variation among genotypes for culinary quality has been shown to be heritable; however, the efficacy of selection depends on a knowledge of the genetic control of the measured traits. A diallel mating design was used to estimate the combining ability of parents and determine the inheritance of nine culinary quality traits important to processors and consumers. Genetic variability among eight parents, 56 F2, and 56 F3 progenies was confirmed by significant mean squares from analyses of variance. Significant variability detected between F2 and F3 progenies for soaked bean weight (SBWT), soaked bean water content (SBWC), and clumps (CLMP) was due to inbreeding effects. General combining ability (GCA) components were highly significant and overshadowed specific combining ability (SCA) components in the F2 and F3 for SBWT, SBWC, split beans (SPLT), and the washed-drained weight coefficient (WDWTR), indicating that additive variance predominated. Ratios of GCA : SCA components were equal to or less than unity for CLMP, washed-drained weight (WDWT), and texture (TEXT), indicating that both additive and nonadditive effects contributed to trait expression. Significant SCA effect variances were noted for 'Sanilac', 'San Fernando', 'Nep-2', and 'A-30' for WDWT and TEXT. Graphs of the regression of Vr on Wr showed that genes controlling WDWT TEXT were completely dominant in most cases. Recurrent selection, which seeks to concentrate favorable alleles with additive effects in populations, may be an effective breeding procedure to improve the culinary quality of dry beans. It is not feasible to breed for TEXT and WDWT simultaneously because of a negative correlation between the traits