Environmental variability and heritability of high oleic acid content in winter oilseed rape

Winter oilseed rape, with high oleic (HO) acid contents (C18 : 1) is of int erest for nutritional as well as for industrial purposes. HO mutants have b een described, but only limited information is available on any environment al influence on the expression of oleic acid content in these mutants. Ther efore, a population of 60 doubled-haploid (DH) lines segregating for oleic acid content (56-75% C18 : 1) was grown in two years at three locations in northern Germany. Analysis of variance revealed a high heritability for ole ic acid content of h(2) = 0.99. Subdivid ing the DH population into a high (> 64% C18 : 1) and a low ( < 64% C18 : 1) oleic acid class showed high her itabilities (h(2) = 0.94) for C18 : 1 contents within both the high and low oleic acid types. The oleic acid contents in HO types of winter oilseed ra pe were environmentally stable at the three locations tested.