Male sterile line in Asiatic carrot developed

Abstract

Male sterility in crop plants has always been admired by the plant breeders for their usefulness in hybrid seed production. The male sterility in temperate carrot has been available since long [1, 2]. There are two main sources of cytoplasmic male sterility (CMS) identified in carrots: i) Petaloid and carpeloid CMS system which was found in wild stocks of carrot where, stamens get modified to petals [3] or to carpels [4]. ii) Brown anther type CMS, where, anthers get dried and deformed due to degeneration [5]. Newer sources for both types of CMS have been found in the recent years. However, there are no reports of male sterile lines in Asiatic carrot. Therefore, attempts were made to isolate male sterile line(s) from the carrot material collected from the local markets.