title: Inheritance of pollen-less anthers and "thrum" and "pin" flowers in periwinkle.
abstract: Two mutants, 1 with small, pollen-less anthers (OR-EA) and another with "pin" flowers (EMS 13-2), in contrast to "thrum" flowers found in normal periwinkle (Catharanthus roseus) plants, were isolated after induced mutagenesis in strain OR and cultivar, "Dhawal," respectively. Inheritance of these 2 traits, pollen-less anthers, and pin flowers was studied by crossing the mutants with their respective parental strains. Segregation ratios observed in F(2) and testcross generations of the cross OR-EA x OR suggested that the pollen-less anthers trait was determined by duplicate recessive genes. Data obtained from F(2) and F(3) generations of the cross involving mutant EMS 13-2 with pin flowers and its parental variety Dhawal, suggested that production of pin (mutant) and thrum (normal) flowers was under the control of inhibitory epistatic interaction between 2 independently inherited genes.
authors.affiliation: Central Institute of Medicinal and Aromatic Plants, Resource Centre, Allalasandra, Bangalore 560 065, India. krnpbg@yahoo.co.in
authors.forename: R N
authors.initials: RN
authors.lastname: Kulkarni
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Baskaran
mesh_terms: D030008:Catharanthus / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000235:genetics*; D035264:Flowers / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000235:genetics*; D040582:Inheritance Patterns; D051479:Plant Infertility / Q000235:genetics; D030821:Plants, Genetically Modified; D011058:Pollen / Q000235:genetics*