Lenci Mibang, Sujata Upadhyay, Obadiya Rai, S. Manivannan and Venkata Ramana Muddarsu
Abstract
The study was conducted at Dept. of Horticulture, Sikkim University, Gangtok during 2017-2018 with an objective to discriminate northeastern pomelo using ionomic profiling and multivariate statistics. Five different states of northeastern region were selected which are considered to have maximum pomelo diversity in India and fruits along with its soil from rhizosphere were examined. In this paper, discrimination of different pomelo germplasm was carried out based on their geographical origin using multi-elemental profiling. Twenty-one elements (Ba, Pb, Ag, Al, Ca, Cd, Co, Cs, Cu, S, Li, Mg, Na, U, B, Zn, Hg, Si, I, Ce, Mo) were determined by Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS). The ANOVA, PCA and LDA were applied to discriminate the origin of pomelo. ANOVA had revealed significant difference between twenty one elements from different geographical origin, both in soil and fruit. Magnesium (Mg) was found to be most abundant element however its concentration was relatively higher in fruit peel than pulp. Multivariate tools such as PCA and LDA have shown the geographical origin of pomelo, distinctly producing five individual groupings.