Genetics and Plant Breeding

The science which underlies the improvement of plants and animals for agricultural purposes is destined to receive increasing attention in agricultural education and in agricultural practice. Without doubt vast possibilities await realization through the more thorough and systematic development of our living economic resources. Such development is directly dependent upon the successful utilization of genetic principles in plant and animal breeding. This text has been prepared in response to a real and widely recognized need. The experience of the authors in teaching the principles of breeding to undergraduate students has forced home the conviction that an adequate presentation in a single text of the facts and principles of genetics and their practical applications is a prime necessity.

PART I: FUNDAMENTALS

1. Introduction

2. Scope, methods, and applications of genetics

3. Physical basis

4. Development

5. Reproduction

6. Heredity

7. Mendelian method

8. Segregation

9. Mendelian conceptions

10. Sex linkage or heterosomal inheritance

11. Heterozygous expressions

12. Lethal factors

13. Multiple allelomorphism

14. Sex-limited characters

15. Independent assortment

16. Factor interactions in development

17. Linkage

18. The organization of linkage groups

19. Variation

20. Variation

21. The statistics of variation

22. Developmental variation

23. Quantitative characters

24. Pure lines and clones

25. Selection

26. Factor mutation

27. Parallel variation

28. Chromosomal variation

29. Sectional variation

30. The oenothera investigations

31. Interspecific hybridization

PART II: PLANT BREEDING

1. Introduction

2. Varieties

3. Chimeras

4. Clonal selection

5. Pure-line selection

6. Selection in cross-fertilized plants

7. The utilization of hybrid vigor

8. Breeding new varieties by hybridization

9. Breeding disease-resistant plants

10. Plant-breeding methods