Singh, Dhirendra KumarPanchbhaiya, Ankit2018-09-052018-09-052015-06http://krishikosh.egranth.ac.in/handle/1/5810071915The present investigation was carried out at Vegetable Research Center, G.B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, Pantnagar, Udham Singh Nagar (U.K.) during Jan – May, 2014. Seventy-four genotypes of french bean were grown in Randomized Block Design with three replications to assess variability, heritability, genetic advance, correlation coefficient, path coefficient, principal component analysis and D2 analysis. Observations were recorded on 22 quantitative characters viz., days to 1st flowering, days to 50% flowering, days to 50% pod setting, days to 50% maturity, days to 1st picking, days to 2nd picking, , number of pods per cluster, number of pod clusters per plant, number of pods per plant, pod dia, pod length, leaf length, leaf width, single pod weight, plant height, number of seeds per pod, seed length, seed width, 100 seed weight, seed yield per plant, pod yield per plant and pod yield per hectare. Analysis of variance revealed significant differences among all the genotypes for all the characters. On the basis of yield contributing characters the following genotypes were found superior viz., FB-202, followed by FB-209, FB-236, Arka Suvidha and FB-205. High heritability coupled with greater genetic advance was observed for plant height. Pod yield per plant showed positive and highly significant correlation with days to 50% flowering, seed yield per plant, plant height, number of pods per plant and weight of single pod. Path coefficient analysis revealed that single pod weight exerted high order of positive direct effect towards pod yield followed by number of pods per plant and number of pods per cluster. However, days to 2 picking, followed by 100 seed weight and days to 50% maturity, exerted negative direct effect towards pod yield. Principal component analysis showed that the first principal component had maximum of 30.85% variation of total variation, while the first seven principal component axes together with explained 83.41% variation, suggesting first seven principal axes are adequate to explain the variation in reduced dimension. Clustering through D2 analysis revealed maximum inter-cluster distance of clusters V and IX followed by cluster III and IX therefore, it is recommended that genotypes grouped under cluster IX, V and III were found promising for most of the traits including fruit yield, can be utilized as potent lines in french bean future breeding programme for the development of superior varieties.ennullThesis