A preliminary study on the introduction of Descurainia sophia, an oil plant species for industrial uses

Abstract

The authors had collected some cruciferous oil plants with high linolenic acid content in Sichuan Province. The result of fatty acid analysis had shown that Malcolmia africana (L. ) R. Br. and Arabis hirsuta (L. ) Scop. have a higher linolenic acid content of 57.37% and 51.38% respectively. Thus they are worthy for further study - Descurainia sophia (L. ) Webb. ex Prantl, especially that collected from Hongyuan County, has a high seed oil content of 44. 17%, a linolenic acid content of 40.9% and a high seed yield of 1 264.5 kg/hm-2. It is suggested that this oil plant species can be introduced for industrial utilization.