Inheritance of anthocyanins in berries of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Vitis vinifera</Emphasis> grapes

Inheritance patterns for table grape anthocyanins were investigated on three cross offspring populations during two successive years. Sixteen anthocyanins were detected, and all were monoglucoside derivatives. The proportion of anthocyanins in the maternal parent determined the proportion of anthocyanins in the offspring. But the absolute content of the maternal parent had no significant effect on progenies. Peonidin 3-O-glucoside and malvidin 3-O-glucoside were the most abundant anthocyanins, not only in the maternal parent but also in the progenies. The presence or absence of anthocyanins in grape skin was inheritance of a quality character controlled by oligogenes, and anthocyanins content was a quantitative character controlled by polygenes. Via principal component (PC) analysis, factors that affected the total content of cross progeny populations were peonidin 3-O-glucoside, malvidin 3-O-glucoside, delphinidin 3-O-glucoside, cyanidin 3-O-glucoside, petunidin 3-O-glucoside, peonidin 3-O-(6-O-coumaryl)-glucoside, and malvidin 3-O-(6-O-coumaryl)-glucoside. Anthocyanins content was a high broad sense heritability character (H²), and H² was stable in different cross combinations (ranging from 0.65 to 0.98).