Heterotic quantitative trait loci analysis and genomic prediction of seedling biomass-related traits in maize triple testcross populations.

Our results demonstrated that the triple testcross design is suitable for detecting heterotic quantitative trait loci and evaluating the prediction accuracy. Seedling leaf width can be used as the representative trait for seedling prediction. The heterotic quantitative trait loci are not necessary for genomic prediction of seedling biomass-related traits.