Oral Paper

         Crops and Wild Relatives

Early leaf shape variation in Brassica oleracea morphotypes and their wild relatives

Presenting Author
Makenzie Mabry
Description
Brassica oleracea is renowned for its diverse cultivars, such as broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, kale, and kohlrabi. However, distinguishing between these cultivars and their wild relatives during early growth stages is challenging. To address this issue, we aimed to investigate whether the variation present in B. oleracea can be detected from young leaves using traditional leaf descriptors and morphometric methods, including Elliptic Fourier Descriptors (EFDs). Our study revealed that there is indeed variation among the cultivars of B. oleracea and its wild relatives. However, clustering analysis using linear discriminant analyses (LDA) and machine learning confirmed the difficulty in classifying these species during early growth stages due to their similar morphological features. These findings have significant implications for the classification and breeding of B. oleracea and its wild relatives and could facilitate the development of new cultivars with improved traits.