Cassava (Manihot esculenta Crantz), an important dietary staple in many countries, supplies food for one billion people in the world. Due to dietary importance, currently cassava cultivation is promoted in Sri Lanka. Even though there are different cassava cultivars grown, no studies have been conducted on cultivar discrimination and preference on their tubers for consumption. Therefore, the present study was conducted to study the morphological and genetic diversity, and assess the consumer preference of cassava cultivars grown in Sri Lanka. Morphological traits of leaves, stems and tubers, chlorophyll content, ascorbic acid content of leaves, dry matter content of leaves and tubers were recorded. The genetic diversity was assessed by sequencing and analyzing the ITS, a DNA barcoding locus. The leaf morphology of wild-accession and Landrace cultivars were considerably different from the rest. The stem morphology was highly different, mainly in the internodal length. A significantly high number of tubers were observed in the cultivar Suranimala. The significant associations were observed from color, aroma, texture, bitterness, hardness and overall taste vs. cassava cultivars. The nine cultivars were separated through ITS polymorphism. In phylogenetic analysis, wild-accession was the most genetically distant type having nine unique SNPs and one INDEL. Other cultivars were mainly divided into two clusters. Thus, it is possible to employ ITS barcoding marker to discriminate the cultivars of M. esculenta.

The limited availability of high-quality planting material hinders the popularization of bael (Aegle marmelos (L.) Corr.) as a profitable cash crop in Sri Lanka. Five elite bael accessions, namely, Beheth Beli, Paragammana, Mawanella, Rambukkana, and Polonnaruwa-Supun, have been identified and used for mass propagation through budding and grafting. However, this process gets hampered by the limitations in large-scale production of planting material. Micropropagation is an alternative technique to produce clonal plants in large-scale; however, no established protocol is available for the field-grown elite bael accessions in Sri Lanka, and hence, the present study was conducted. The best sterilization method was found to be the washing of explants in a 2.5% fungicide solution for two hours. The full MS and ½MS media provided significantly similar performance in shooting, as indicated by the measured parameters. The twig plants did better than leaf explants concerning shoot extension, in which twig explants yield 1.33 cm taller shoots. The 1 mg/l of BAP concentration generated the highest number of shoots (6.20) and the most extended shoots (3.83 cm). The most successful rooting (60% success) was spotted with full MS, 1 mg/ml NAA, and 3% sugar. As previously reported, the successful micropropagation is possible if the explants are harvested from April to June, immediately after the fruiting season of the plant. The established protocol can mass-produce clonal bael plants from the elite accessions.