Biochemical Markers of Environmental Stress Tolerance in Finger Millet [Eleusine coracana (L) Gaertn] Germplasm of Central Himalayan Region

Round the globe, availability of the germplasm of suitable crops for cultivation in remote, inaccessible and resource poor terrains is crucial for food security in these regions. Rich diversity of millets, which are highly tolerant to extreme weather conditions, is available in the Central Himalayan Region (CHR). However, biochemical evaluation of available germplasm for food security is a major issue yet to be addressed properly. In this backdrop plant exploration and germplasm collection expeditions were conducted to collect and evaluate the genetic diversity of finger millet (Fig. 1). A total of 314 accessions having traits of agronomic importance were collected and evaluated for three consecutive years. In addition to battery of biochemical traits, yield was recorded to find out suitable germplasm for large scale cultivation/ breeding programme. At flowering stage variability in antioxidants level of leaves such as glutathione and ascorbate ranged from 105.27 – 423.63 mmol.g-1FW and 4.89 – 10.21 mmol.g-1FW respectively. Extensive variability in the activity of enzymes important for multiple abiotic stress tolerance viz., catalase (115 – 855 mmol hydrogen peroxide decomposed.min-1.mg-1 protein), peroxidase (1.24 - 6.35 mmol substrate.min.-1.mg-1 protein), superoxide dismutase (1236 – 2963 enzyme U.mg-1 protein), glutathione reductase (0.53 – 2.14 mmol substrate.min-1.mg-1 protein), ascorbate peroxidase (1.86 – 7.04 mmol substrate.min-1.mg-1 protein), monodehydroascorbate reducatase (1.11 – 4.41 mmol substrate.min-1.mg-1 protein), dehydroascorbate reducatase (0.34 – 1.36 mmol substrate.min-1.mg-1 protein) was also recorded. Worldwide Abiotic/ environmental stresses hamper agricultural production. Enzymatic and non-enzymatic defence system precisely controls this situation. Hence, biochemical evaluation might be an appropriate strategy for identification of suitable germplam to combat the problem of food security in such areas.