Genetic effects conferring heat tolerance in upland cotton ( Gossypium hirsutum L.)

Background Climate change and particularly global warming has emerged as an alarming threat to the crop productivity of field crops and exerted drastic effects on the cropping patterns. Production of cotton has been dropped down to one million bales from 1.4 million bales since 2015 in Pakistan due to the increase in temperature at critical growth stages, i.e., flowering and boll formation. Keeping in view the importance of cotton in the country, this study was conducted to investigate the genetic effects conferring heat tolerance in six populations (P1, P2, F1, F2, BC1 and BC2) developed from cross-1 and cross-2, i.e., VH-282 × FH-142 and DNH-40 × VH-259.