The project will deliver two niche industrial crop varieties of Camelina sativa and Brassica carinata. Both of these species are related to the highly successful Brassica napus (canola).

The goal is not to produce another commodity food crop, but to contract the controlled acreage of niche market industrial oilseeds both to maintain segregation from the food supply, and to maintain high-value for producers and downstream manufacturers of formulated bioproducts.

The oil from these crop varieties will not be used for food, but as optimized oil feedstocks for industrial formulation of both fuel and non-fuel bio-products. As such, the end goals for crop breeding can be vastly different from those of traditional varieties. Levels of different long chain fatty acids (oils) can be optimized for different industrial processes for manufacturing different end products. Levels of glucosinolates can be increased and purified for use as natural pesticides.

Optimization of these industrial crop varieties is facilitated by the use of genomic tools which can build on the knowledge and expertise already gained in the established Brassica research and development community.