BGN 4: Root character of curly mutants in barley BARLEY GENETICS NEWSLETTER, VOL. 4, II. RESEARCH NOTES
Tsuchiya, pp. 88-91

II.42. Root character of curly mutants in barley.

T. Tsuchiya, Department of Agronomy, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado 80521, USA.

Pleiotropic effects of a mutant gene is rather common in barley mutations. Diagnostic traits of a mutant are observed in various plant organs including roots. However, the character expression in roots may not be observed very often when the seeds are planted directly into the field.

In our experiments, most of the seeds are germinated in heavy blotting (germination) paper in germinating boxes. During the experiments an interesting diagnostic trait characteristic of curly mutants was found. The character expression varied in different strains.

Table 1 shows the mutant names, gene symbol, stock and description of diagnostic characters of various curly mutants. Figures 1 to 11 showed about 4 day-old seeds of eight mutants and three original varieties.

Figures 1-11. Root characters of curly mutants of barley (cf. Table 1).

Table 1. Various "curly" mutants and their original variety (control) - their name, gene symbol, source and main diagnostic traits.

The expression of the curly root character in curly 2 (cu2), dwarf 2, deformed (Bikini), and KM118 was especially pronounced. This root character may be used as a good seedling marker in genetic and linkage studies.

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