DIVERSITY FOR RESPONSES TO SOME BIOTIC AND ABIOTIC STRESSES AND MULTIVARIATE ASSOCIATIONS IN KABULI CHICKPEA (CICER-ARIETINUM L)

Kabuli chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) is the common cultivated type of chickpea in arid and semi-arid environments in the Mediterranean regio n. Ascochyta blight, (Ascochyta rabiei (Pass.) Labr.), leaf miner (Lir iomyza cicerina, Rond.) and cold, are the three most important stresse s on chickpea grown under semi-arid conditions in this region. Phenoty pic frequencies for responses to these stresses in the eight major chi ckpea-growing regions of the world were estimated from 5,672 kabuli ch ickpea accessions assembled from these regions. In addition, the acces sions were evaluated for 12 morpho-physiological and three phenologica l characters under semi-arid Mediterranean conditions at the Internati onal Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA), Alepp o, Syria. Considerable regional differences in frequency distributions for response to the three stresses were observed. Average phenotypic diversity for responses to the three stresses was lower (H(o) = 0.474) than for morpho-physiological (H(o) = 0.754) and phenological (H(o) = 0.812) characters. The highest frequencies of accessions resistance t o Ascochyta-blight and leaf-miner were found in South Asia and South C entral Asia, respectively. A small number of chickpea breeding materia ls of ICARDA showed a moderate level of tolerance to cold. A group of four characters showing the strongest bivariate association with each of the three stresses was identified from the latter group. Then, a di screte multivariate log-linear analysis of the five-way frequency tabl e was performed for each group. The simplest log-linear model for each group included both two- and three-factor association terms, but no i ndependent factors. This suggested the potential for indirect selectio n for stress tolerance using one or more of these associated character s. The roles of these characters in ideotype breeding of kabuli chickp ea for arid and semi-arid Mediterranean conditions deserves careful as sessment.