Spontaneous Chromosome Aberrations and Abnormal Behaviours in Italian Maize Populations

Abstract

Some of the spontaneous chromosome aberrations and abnormal behaviour observed in the meiosis of sibling plants from open pollinated Italian maize populations have been reported. It has been found that the frequency of chromosome breaks and other aberrations in this material is rather very high. In one case the chromosome aberrations are accompanied by visible morphological “mutation”-dioecious inflorescence-tassel-ear type.
Various other abnormalities such as pachytene pairing failure, secondary association at metaphase and univalent and multivalent formation, differences in the length of satellite segment on chromosome 6 and differential contraction of heterochromatic segments and their effects on general chromosome behaviour have been discussed. The importance of heterochromatin in all these aberrations has been stressed.