Detection of promising jackfruit genotypes through morpho-biochemical diversity and multivariate analysis

Jackfruit ( Artocarpus heterophyllus Lam.) is a climate-resilient tropical fruit tree with extensive nutritional and economic value. Despite its wide genetic variability, systematic evaluation of morpho-biochemical traits with multivariate analysis remains limited, particularly for identifying genetically promising genotypes for future breeding programme. Thirty jackfruit genotypes were evaluated for 24 morpho-biochemical traits to assess variability, trait correlations and genetic divergence. Substantial phenotypic variability was observed across traits, with fruit weight ranging from 1.28 to 18.08 kg and yield from 37.12 to 1459.35 kg tree⁻¹. High coefficients of variation were recorded for fruit core weight (27.22), bulb thickness (25.94), seed weight (20.09), yield (19.44), fruit rind weight (18.55) and fruit weight (18.42), indicating strong selection potential. Most traits showed positive skewness and leptokurtic distribution, reflecting the presence of superior genotypes, while a few traits showed near-normal distribution. Pearson correlation analysis revealed 66 significant positive and 6 negative correlations, with significant associations among fruit size and yield traits (fruit weight with rind weight, length and diameter; r ≥ 0.75, p ≤ 0.001), suggesting corresponding indicating possible relations useful for selection. Principal component analysis showed that the first two components explained 46.90% of total variation, with PC1 (31.20%) dominated by fruit size and yield parameters and PC2 (15.70%) by biochemical attributes. Heatmap-based hierarchical clustering grouped genotypes into two major clusters, clearly separating divergent genotypes such as BSK, BSC-1 and BSC-2. Promising genotypes including Nagachandra, Palur-1 and Pechiparai were associated with superior fruit size and yield, whereas Thailand Pink and Vietnam Early were linked to enhanced biochemical traits. The integration of morpho-biochemical characterization and multivariate analyses revealed significant diversity among jackfruit genotypes and identified genetically promising candidates for future breeding and and multi-location evaluation. Strong positive correlations among key traits and the presence of highly divergent genotypes highlight the potential for developing high-yielding and nutritionally superior cultivars.