Analysis of Genotypic Diversity in Sesame Based on Morphological and Agronomic Traits

Abstract

Sesame is known to be the most ancient oil seed crop dating back to 3050-3500 B.C (Bedigian and Harlan, 1986). It is grown in tropical and subtropical areas of the world. It can set seed and yield well under fairly high temperature it can grow in stored soil moisture without rainfall and irrigation. But continuous flooding or severe drought adversely affect sesame plants and resulted in low yield (Mensah et al., 2009). Another major cause of poor yield of sesame is due to low yielding cultivars. Development of improved plant cultivars is restricted by mainly limited genetic variability. Due to narrow genetic pool it is not possible to restructure the sesame crop. It has been suggested that sesame cultivation under such degradable condition has caused serious genetic erosion for yield, where selections within the local varieties fails to respond favorably to high input managements.