SELECTION AND EVALUATION OF SILKWORM (Bombyx mori L.) BREEDS FOR HYBRIDIZATION IN SERICULTURE IMPROVEMENT

Abstract

Considered a decisive factor in the sericulture agro-industry, the development of high-yielding, healthy silkworm hybrids, robust silkworm hybrids are essential for commercially successful and sustainable production. Therefore, screening and prioritizing and superior parental lines for breeding program must be accordingly. This study aims to systematically evaluate the performance of diverse silkworm germplasm comprising 10 bivoltine and 5 multivoltine breeds, preserved and maintained at the Vietnam Sericulture Research Centre (VIETSERI) from which promising parental breeds used for future heterosis breeding would be suitably identified. The multivoltine breeds (VBL, RVTB, HLS, etc) exhibited excellent health characteristics, presented by good hatching (up to 97.83%, much higher than usual), higher survival (up to 92.15%) and pupation rates (up to 97.85%) whereas the bivoltine ones (e.g., TQ10, HQ2, IN03, IN02) demonstrated significantly better cocoon quality, excelling in SCW, CSW and CSR (up to 21.13%). As a results, the bivoltine breed TQ10 (50.78), followed by HQ4 (50.50), VN7 (50.43), IN03 (50.43), IN02 (50.30) and TQ1 (50.18) was selected based on the Evaluation Index. The study’s results showed that the bivoltine breeds coded TQ10, HQ4, VN7, IN03, and IN02 were screened as elite parental breeds for improving silk yield and quality. The multivoltine breeds were considered valuable genetic resources for enhancing hardiness and can be used for recommend specific crossing strategies to develop high-performance hybrids for Vietnam's sericulture industry.