Selection of winter rye (Secale cereale L.) inbred lines for general and specific combining ability and its relationship with valuable traits

Creation of F1 heterosis hybrids instead of population varieties is an advanced breeding technology since XX century. The rye as a strictly cross-pollinated culture is rather perspective for heterotic breeding. The success depends on the use of rye homozygous lines with high combining ability. The topcrossing allows effective estimates of the best genotypes to be used in synthesis of high heterotic hybrids. This paper is the first characterization of the authors' winter rye unique high-homozygous inbred lines, which are based on three Russian gene pools, with high combining ability intended for breeding programs. The purpose of our researches was to estimate by topcrossing method the general and specific combining ability of winter rye inbred lines. Test crossings in 2016 involved five sterile lines with type Pampas cytoplasm (Н-649, Н-577, Н-842, Н-1058, and Н-1185), and four male fertile lines (Н-451, Н-1011, Н-1247, and Н-1071) as testers. In total, 20 simple F1 interlinear hybrids were selected...