Characterization of yield and fruit quality parameters of Vietnamese elite tomato lines generated through phenotypic selection and conventional breeding methods

Abstract

Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) is the second most important vegetable crop after potatoes, and global demands have been steadily increasing in recent years. Conventional and modern breeding techniques have been applied to breed and domesticate tomato varieties to meet the need for higher yield or superior agronomical traits that allow them to sustain under different climatic conditions. In the current study, we applied bulk population breeding by crossing eight tomato accessions procured from the Asian Vegetable Research and Development Center with three heat-resistant tomato inbred lines from Vietnam and generated ten elite tomato (ET) lines in the F8 generation. The individual F8 lines exhibited robust vigor and adaptability to climatic conditions of North Vietnam. Among the ten lines, ET1 and ET3 displayed indeterminate growth. ET2 showed semi-determinate, while all the other lines had determinate growth. The different ET lines showed distinctive superior agronomical traits, including early maturing (ET4, ET7, and ET10), highly efficient fruit set (ET1), higher yield (ET1, ET8, ET10), jointless pedicels (ET2), and partial parthenocarpy (ET9). Molecular analysis revealed that the ET3 line consisted of Ty-1 and Ty-3 loci that positively contribute to Tomato yellow leaf curl virus resistance in tomato plants. The elite tomato lines developed in this study would contribute significantly to the Vietnamese and Asian gene pool for improved tomato production and would be a valuable resource for various breeding goals.