Genetic analysis of salt tolerance during germination in Lycopersicon

The salt-tolerant cultivated tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum) accession, 'PI174263', and a sensitive cv, 'UCT5', were crossed to develop reciprocal F1, F2 and BC1 populations for genetic analysis of salt tolerance in tomatoes during seed germination. Variation was partitioned into embryo, endosperm and maternal (testa and cytoplasmic) components. Generation means analysis indicated that there were no significant embryo (additive, dominance or epistatic) effects on germination performance under salt stress. Highly significant endosperm additive and testa dominance effects were detected. The proportion of the total variance explained by the model containing these two components was R(2)=98.2%. Variance component analysis indicated a large genetic variance with additive gene action as the predominant component. Furhter inspection indicated that this variance was attributable to endosperm additive effects on germinability under salt stress. Narrow-sense heritability was estimated as moderately high. Implications for breeding procedures are discussed.