African Journal of
Agricultural Research

  • Abbreviation: Afr. J. Agric. Res.
  • Language: English
  • ISSN: 1991-637X
  • DOI: 10.5897/AJAR
  • Start Year: 2006
  • Published Articles: 6859

Full Length Research Paper

Use of millimeter ruler as an alternative tool in the phenotyping of potential descriptors of soybean

Ronaldo Machado Junior
  • Ronaldo Machado Junior
  • Departament of Genetic and Breeding, Federal University of Viçosa, Viçosa-MG, Brazil.
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Guilherme Ferreira Alves
  • Guilherme Ferreira Alves
  • Institute of Plant Science, Federal University of Viçosa -Rio Paranaíba, Rio Paranaíba-MG, Brazil.
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Victor Afonso Reis Gonçalves
  • Victor Afonso Reis Gonçalves
  • Departament of Genetic and Breeding, Federal University of Viçosa, Viçosa-MG, Brazil.
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Sylas Clemente Oliveira
  • Sylas Clemente Oliveira
  • Institute of Plant Science, Federal University of Viçosa -Rio Paranaíba, Rio Paranaíba-MG, Brazil.
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Ronaldo Silva Gomes
  • Ronaldo Silva Gomes
  • Departament of Plant Science, Federal University of Viçosa, Viçosa-MG, Brazil.
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Paulo Roberto Cecon
  • Paulo Roberto Cecon
  • Departament of Estatistics, Federal University of Viçosa, Viçosa-MG, Brazil.
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Silvana da Costa Ferreira
  • Silvana da Costa Ferreira
  • Institute of Biological Sciences and Health, Federal University of Viçosa - Rio Paranaíba, Rio Paranaíba-MG, Brazil.
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Eder Matsuo
  • Eder Matsuo
  • Institute of Exact Sciences and Technological, Federal University of Viçosa - Rio Paranaíba, Rio Paranaíba-MG, Brazil.
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  •  Received: 15 May 2018
  •  Accepted: 18 June 2018
  •  Published: 12 July 2018

Abstract

The soybean stands out in the Brazilian agribusiness and part of this success stems from the development of improved cultivars. One of the requirements for the concession of protection to a given cultivar is that it should be distinct from others cultivars. Potential additional descriptors of soybean have been studied. Thus, the aim of this study was to evaluate the performance of the millimeter ruler in the measurement of the lengths of hypocotyl and epicotyl in seedlings of soybean and to compare the methods based on the use of millimeter ruler and the method based on the use of caliper. The hypocotyl and epicotyl of 1.084,0 plants in the stage V2 and 1.252,0 plants in the stage V3 were measured by digital caliper and millimeter ruler in 2014 and 2015. The plants were kept in a greenhouse. The linear regression (Y = βX), bias, concordance index, performance index, sample standard deviation and confidence interval were used to evaluate the performance. The millimeter ruler overestimated the length of epicotyl and hypocotyl by 0.0508 and 0.0147 mm, respectively. The millimeter ruler had an optimum performance in the measurement of the lengths of hypocotyl and epicotyl in seedlings of soybean in V2 and V3. A millimeter ruler is an alternative tool in the measurement of seedlings of soybean in most of the developmental stages.

Key words: Epicotyl, Glycine max, hypocotyl, additional descriptors.