Male sterility derived from Cajanus sericeus x Cajanus cajan: Confusion ofcytoplasmic male sterility with dominant genic male sterility

The male sterile plants that segregated in a BC5F2 of 'C. sericeus x C. caj an var. TT-5' population were maintained by sib mating. The male sterile pl ants were crossed with ICPL-85012. Approximately 50% of the F-1 plants were sterile. F-2 plants derived from the fertile F-1 plants did not segregate for male sterility. The reciprocal hybrid i.e. ICPL-85012 x Fertile derivat ives from C. sericeus x TT-5, did not express male sterility. However, amon g the 12 F-2 plant to row progenies, two segregated 25% male sterile plants and remaining 10 did not segregate. The segregation pattern in subsequent progenies revealed that the sterility was under control of a single recessi ve allele. Studies on the backcross and their BC1F2 and BC1F3 progenies rev ealed another sterility gene which was found to be dominant in inheritance. This paper shows that what was thought to be cytoplasmic male sterility fr om C. sericeus cytoplasm is actually a single dominant gene possibly acting in concert with a single recessive gene to mimic cytoplasmic male sterilit y.