Graphical profiles as an aid to understanding plant breeding experiments

In many plant improvement programs, a considerable number of genotypes (more strictly lines) are grown in a range of environments (which may refer to different locations within the same or different years). The outcomes (or responses) will usually be described by several attributes measured on each genotype within a particular environment. Often, comparison of the patterns of genotype response across environments is more useful that the traditional comparison of individual responses. Successive graphical presentations are used to summarize the information contained in such plant breeding experiments. They include overlap plots, their corresponding semigraphical tables, and profiles across environments for individual genotypes and groups of genotypes. The interpretation of these displays, as an aid to understanding these experiments, is illustrated and discussed.