In spite of different reports about the inheritance of cotyledon colour in lentil, the precise nature of this phenomenon is unknown. In a comprehensive study, conducted in 1993-96 on inheritance of morphological markers in lentil, two types of green colour, light green and dark-green lentils, were distinguished for the first time. The dark-green showed monogenic and the light-green showed digenic inheritance. To explain this, involvement of three genes, Dg, Y and B in the inheritance of cotyledon colour were considered. At the dominant state of gene Dg, the genes Y and B produce yellow and brown pigments, respectively. At the recessive state (dg dg), no pigment will be produced and the dark-green colour will appear. If gene Dg acts normally (dominant state), but both genes Y and B are at recessive state (Dg-yybb), again no pigment will be produced and cotyledons will be of light-green colour.

Keywords: Lentil, Cotyledon colour inheritance, Trigenic control

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