Abstract: The rich germplasm resource is an important guarantee in sustainable development of maize breeding?and production． Mining local germplasm is one of effective ways to widen corn germplasm foundation by population?improvement． Maize populations Huangjin population selected via mass selection (MS) and half-sib reciprocal recurrent selection (HS-RRS) were assessed for changes in grain yield per plant and ear traits by field trial in two locations． The results showed that both methods could effectively improve the grain yield per plant of Huangjin population，there were gradual increasing tendency in grain yield per plant of populations and average increase by 3． 78%?per cycle，in which the average increase for MS and HS-RRS improved populations was 4． 27% and 2． 07% per cycle respectively，although the coefficient of variation was slight decreasing 15． 43% to 12． 80%． But there was a copious supply of heritable variation in the population． The comparison with the ear traits of the different populations?showed that ear length and kernel number per ear row increased by 14． 71% and 17． 62% respectively，which suggested that the reason of increase of grain yield per plant for improved populations was predominantly contributed to?increase of the traits．

Key words: Maize, Population improvement, Recurrent selection, Yield trait

CLC Number: 

• S513.03