Growth production and color segregation on the plants and seeds of F2-F3 generations selected from population derived from crossing yellow and purple corn

Abstract

Purple-corn becomes more popular as a functional food. This research was to develop superior purple-corn varieties. Series of research were carried out in 2021-2023 at Research Station and with cooperation with farmer near Campus Universitas Sriwijaya. In crossing, purple-corn was used as male parent to produce F1-seeds and resulted in F2-seed consisted of 4 purple-coloration of dark-purple, purple, yellowish-purple, and purpleish-yellow. Later on, research only utilized those F2-seeds having dark-purple. Dual-planting system was used to produce fresh-boiled corncob and dry-corn kernel. The F2-plants showed normal growth with plant heights of 244.63-258.87 cm; ear position at 104.97-113.23 cm; and anthesis at 54-56 days. Fresh-weight of fresh corncob harvested at 84 days reached 155.19-160.79 g, and dry-corn-kernel weight, harvested at 109 days reached 128.60-147.78 g/plant. The accessions, in general showed good potential to be candidate for open-pollinated varieties of purple-corn, which included purple-kernel corn, purple-baby corn and purple-boiled corncob varieties. Most F2-plants produced dark-purple and purple kernel and cob that corresponded to purple coloration of the plant, especially purple-line coloration on the leaf. Plants segregation that produced yellow and white-kernel of F3-seeds were about 2.63-23.07%. Further selection program, to minimize purple-kernel segregation was still needed especially for UJ1U accession.