Maize ranks first among worldwide production and an important source of human and animal feed. Its production can be affected by management practices and climatic conditions. The objective of this study was to estimate stability of yield and hundred grains weight of six maize genotypes during two growing seasons at two locations, subjected to four different treatments: T₁ treatment—without herbicide, Control; T₂ treatment—active substance Nicosulfuron and Motivell commercial preparation; T₃ treatment—active substance Rimsulfuron and Tarot; and, T₄ treatment—active substance Forasulfuron and Equip. Additive main effects and multiplicative interaction—AMMI model and genotype × environment interaction—GGE biplot were used to estimate GEI—genotype by environment interaction. The results showed that the influence of genotype (G), year (Y), locality (L), treatment (T) and all interaction on hundred grains weight were significant. The share of genotypes in the total phenotypic variance was 64.70%, while the share in total interaction was 26.88%. The share of IPCA1 in terms of G × T interaction was 50.6%, while share of IPCA2 was 44.74%, which comprised together 94.80% of interaction. The first IPCA1 axis showed high share in the total interaction, which indicates out significance of genotype in total variation and interaction, while high level of IPCA2 indicates a significant treatment effect. Genotype L-6 had the same mass of 100 grains (37.96 g) during both years of testing, while genotype L-1, with 4.46 g, had the largest difference between years. This clearly indicates the influence of genotype but also stress under the influence of sulfonylureas and environmental factors. The maize genotype with the highest values of hundred grains weight, L-5 and L-6, expressed the highest values of grain yield (4665 kg ha⁻¹ and 4445 kg ha⁻¹).

A high level of genetic purity in crop varieties must be achieved and maintained for agronomic performance, encouraging investment and innovation in plant breeding and ensuring that the improvements in productivity and quality imparted by breeders are delivered to the consumer. Since the success of hybrid seed production is dependent upon the genetic purity of the parental lines, in this study, the experimental F1exp maize hybrid and its parental inbreeds were used as a model system to examine the discriminative power of morphological, biochemical and SSR markers for seed purity assay. The highest number of off-type plants was estimated by morphological markers. According to the comparison of prolamins and albumins banding patterns of parental and derived F1exp seeds, genetic impurities could not be detected. Molecular analysis detected two types of genetic profile irregularity. Beside its use for verifying varieties of maize, report on umc1545 primer pair ability to detect non-specific bands (i.e., off-types), in both the maternal component and F1exp, which is the first report on this issue yet, strongly supports the recommendation of this SSR marker use for more accurate and time-efficient maize hybrids and parental lines genetic pyrity testing.

One of the goals in eggplant breeding (Solanum melongena L.) is higher yield. This study included 20 different genotypes that are part of the collection of the Institute for Vegetable Crops Smederevska Palanka. Sixteen genotypes originated from Serbia, two originated from the Netherlands, one originated from Italy, and one originated from Israel. The experiment was conducted at Vranovo (44°36′6.35″ N, 20°59′55.47″ E, altitude 87 m) using a randomized complete block design and three replications. The yield parameters (earliness, plant height/centimeter, number of fruits per plant, fruit weight/gram, fruit length and width/centimeter, and fruit yield per genotype/kilogram) were examined to study the relationships among traits and their effects on eggplant yield. The number of fruits per plant had a positive and significant correlation with yield (r = 0.685 **). Additionally, the results showed positive correlations between plant height and fruit length (r = 0.812 **), between plant height and fruit weight (r = 0.147), and between fruit width and fruit weight (r = 0.523 *). These characteristics had direct or indirect positive effects on yield, so they can be used as selection criteria to increase the final yield of eggplant. Because there is genetic variability between the tested genotypes, progress in breeding will depend on this variation. Earliness had a negative correlation with yield (r = −0.044) and with all other parameters.

Background: This study was carried out for an understanding of the antioxidant mechanisms of field pea varieties under osmotic stress conditions caused by a lack of water. The activities of antioxidant enzymes such as superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT), ascorbate peroxidase (APx) and glutathione reductase (GR) were examined and analyzed. The gene expression levels of Cu/Zn SOD, cAPx and GR genes were also examined. Methods: Osmotic stress was stimulated using PEG 6000 with the osmotic potential of -0.1 MPa in 10 days old plant seedlings. The activity of the antioxidant enzymes was measured in the shoots and roots of pea seedlings. The gene expression levels of genes coding antioxidative enzymes were examined by the reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) technique. Arabidopsis 18S rRNA was used as endogenous control. Result: Osmotic stress changed the activities of antioxidant enzymes in the shoots and roots of pea seedlings. Varieties more tolerant to osmotic stress showed a significant increase in antioxidant activities in shoots and roots, while sensitive varieties showed a significant decrease. The results of the analysis of the expression of genes, coding for antioxidant enzymes, showed that the reaction of the tested cultivars to ROS was the result of increased expression of the tested genes in tolerant cultivars, i.e. decreased expression in sensitive cultivars.