Assessment of rice (Oryza sativa L.) for drought tolerance with SSR markersPThakurauthorKPrasadauthorAPandeauthorSKumarauthorV PChaudharyauthorL CPrasadauthorDrought remains a major constraint in rice (Oryza sativa L.) for productivity in rainfed environments, leading to huge economic loss. Molecular marker technology helps in identifying genomic regions influencing the response of yield and its components to water deficits, which will aid in our understanding the genetics of drought tolerance and development of more drought-tolerant cultivars. Investigation was carried out in rain out shelter at Birsa Agricultural University, Ranchi, Jharkhand with the aim to identify superior F3 segregants having drought-tolerant QTLs, from 100 randomly selected segregants of a cross between drought-tolerant (DT) parent Birsa Gora 102 and drought-susceptible (DS) parent BPT 5204. Check parents Vandana (DT) and IR 20 (DS) were used. Plant height, panicle length, number of tillers, number of effective tillers, grains per panicle, panicle weight, seed yield per plant and test weight were the traits under investigation. Seventeen segregants were identified as superior, with yield higher than 7.03 g/plant. The parents were analyzed with 19 SSR markers, out of which 14 markers were found to be polymorphic. These polymorphic markers were used to analyze the randomly selected segregants. None of the segregants were found to be homozygous at entire 14 loci. Seventeen identified segregants were found to have the drought tolerant QTLs. The genomic regions flanked by the polymorphic markers have been reported to be associated with several drought resistance component traits. Hence, the segregants identified in the early generation can be advanced further to develop drought tolerant cultivar.Crop ImprovementRice2017-02Conference or Workshop Item