Aleurites moluccana L. is grown as a roadside tree in southern China and the oil content of its seed is higher than other oil plants, such as Jatropha curcas and Camellia oleifera. A. moluccana is considered a promising energy plant because its seed oil could be used to produce biodiesel and bio-jet fuel. In addition, the bark, leaves, and kernels of A. moluccana have various medical and commer...

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small noncoding RNAs that play crucial regulatory roles by targeting mRNAs for silencing. To identify miRNAs in Jatropha curcas L, a bioenergy crop, cDNA clones from two small RNA libraries of leaves and seeds were sequenced and analyzed using bioinformatic tools. Fifty-two putative miRNAs were found from the two libraries, among them six were identical to known miRNAs an...

Biodiesel is usually produced by transesterification of vegetable oils or animal fats with chemical catalysts, especially in the presence of strong acidic or basic solutions, such as hydrochloric acid, sulphuric acid, sodium hydroxide, sodium methoxide and potassium hydroxide. Homogeneous alkali catalysts can convert triglycerides to their corresponding fatty acid methyl esters (FAMEs) with hig...

An ever-increasing drift of energy consumption, unequal geographical distribution of natural wealth and the quest for low carbon fuel for a cleaner environment are sparking the production and use of biodiesels in many countries around the globe. In this work, jatropha and karanja biodiesels were produced from the respective crude vegetable oils through transesterification, and the different phy...

An ever-increasing drift of energy consumption, unequal geographical distribution of natural wealth and the quest for low carbon fuel for a cleaner environment are sparking the production and use of biodiesels in many countries around the globe. In this work, jatropha and karanja biodiesels were produced from the respective crude vegetable oils through transesterification, and the different phy...

Biodiesel has emerged as an alternative to non-renewable diesel fuel. Growing demand for biodiesel has given birth to mal practices such as adulteration which degrade its quality. The present study has dealt with the optimization of biodiesel production from Jatropha curcas oil using a five-level-four-factorial central composite design based on response surface methodology in 54 experimental ru...