Morpho-Genetic Screening of the Promising Rice Genotypes under Salinity Stress

Selection of new rice (Oryza sativa L.) variety tolerant to soil salinity is one of the most important issues to avoid salt stress in rice production. In this study, the morphological characterization was performed on 5 rice genotypes under two salt stress treatments EC8 and 12 dS/m at seedling, EC 12 dS/m at vegetative and EC8 dS/m at reproductive stages. Morphological characters and Na+/K+ uptake ratio were surveyed to evaluate salt stress effects. At vegetative stage, all the genotypes have survived. However, at reproductive stage all the genotypes were affected by salt stress except for the Binadhan-10 that survived the whole life cycle. A total of 160 SSR markers were used which revealed 209 alleles among the 5 rice genotypes. Interestingly, 4 SSR markers RM105, RM125, RM178 and RM549 with highest PIC (0.67) value have scored the highest level of genetic diversity value (0.72). These markers could be used to pyramiding the major and minor salt stress related genes via marker assisted selection in rice. The present investigation on variant salt stress responsiveness of 5 promising rice genotypes will be of great value in rice breeding.