Abstract:In order to provide a basis for selecting parents in cross breeding, genetic diversity about plant height and ear position of elite maize inbred lines was analyzed. Based on the SSR markers of plant height and ear position, the genetic diversity of 138 elite maize inbred lines as well as the genetic constitution of 3 improved Luda red cob lines in Jilin Province was analyzed. Unweighted pair-group method with arithmetic means (UPGMA) was adopted to carry out the cluster analysis of the inbred lines. The results showed that 114 allelic variations were detected from 20-pair plant height and ear position-related SSR primers with stable banding patterns. 2 to 12 alleles were detected from each pair of SSR primers, i.e., 5.7 alleles every pair of primers on average. The polymorphic information content (PIC) of each pair of primers varied from 0.028 to 0.78 with the average value of 0.517. Further analysis showed that the PIC value of Luda Red Cob lines was the highest (0.47), followed successively by the Lancaster (0.42), the Tang4pingtou (0.41), and the Reid (0.35). The cluster analysis showed that the maize tested could be divided into 2 groups and 4 subgroups. Lines of Lancaster were found to have a remoter genetic relationship with other lines. Genetic constitution analysis of the three improved Luda Red Cob lines indicated that molecular marker-assisted selection was workable for quantitative character genetic improvement. The results will provide useful reference for maize improvement-breeding according to different plant types.