Genetic Biodiversity and Evolution in Rice

Broadening the gene pool of rice (Oryza sative L.) through the assessment of genetic biodiversity in a set of collected germplasm and cultivated varieties which include phenotypic evaluation, genetic parameters estimation, morphological clustering and evaluation of the genetic structure and divergence by utilizing marker/aided selection to tag favorable QTLs associated with tolerance to abiotic stress, resistance to blast disease and enhance grain yield traits by using SSRs markers and to explore the possible origin of rice genotypes and evolution of traits based on the phylogenic data.