Oil content and fatty acid composition of seed oil from guayule plants with different chromosome numbers

Guayule, a perennial desert plant, is being developed for domestic production of natural rubber, a strategic commodity for which the United States presently depends totally on foreign sources. At present, rubber alone is not sufficient to make guayule a commercial crop, and additional revenues are being sought from by-products. Because guayule flowers profusely during several years of growth before it is harvested for rubber, seed may also contribute to the economics of guayule production. Seed from 120 plants, including 20 genotypes with 36, 37, 54 and 72 chromosomes, were analyzed for oil content and fatty acid composition. Oil content ranged from 17.1 to 30.5%. On average, seed from diploid and aneuploid plants (with 36 and 37 chromosomes) contained 40.4% more oil than the seed from polyploid plants. The oil consisted of four fatty acids—palmitic (8.7–11.5%), stearic (3.7–6.2%), oleic (6.5–13.9%) and linoleic (69.1–80.2%)—at all ploidy levels. Guayule seed oil was similar to the seed oil from high-linoleic safflower varieties. The use of genetic variation to increase seed yield and seed oil will depend on the absence of negative correlation between oil and rubber production.