Analysis of genetic variability and agronomic performance of Indian lettuce (Lactuca indica L.)

Lactuca indica L. is an undomesticated medicinal crop in the Asteraceae family. The study was carried out to identify elite genotypes for lettuce cultivation and breeding improvement. Data recorded 19 morphological developmental traits across 38 accessions (Acc). genotypic mean square variance significant all characters. higher extent of phenotypic coefficient variation were obtained basal branch, leaf blade width, node number. broad-sense heritability (H2B) ranged from 45.85% (seed length) 98.59% (node number), whereas genetic advance as a percentage (GAM%) 9.33 191. Vegetative characters such number, plant height, branches conjugated with high H2B GAM% indicating additive gene effect selection these based on observation effective better gain. Reproductive traits, including bolting duration, flowering seed weight linked H2B, moderate revealing that are amenable improvement, also showed positive correlation. Acc 55 8 best performance majority attributes could be good material further research breeding. In Wards’ phylogenetic tree clustered their rather than geographic origin.