Oilseed crops are grown primarily for the oil contained in the seeds. The major world sources of seed oils are soybeans, sunflowers, rapeseed, cotton, peanuts, linseed, and castor beans. While there are many uses for industrial vegetable oils, total world production is only about 3% of that of edible oils

Fats and oils are essential nutrients, comprising about 40% of the calories in the diet. Edible vegetable oils, margarine, and shortening are used food applications. These products supplement or replace animal products (e.g., butter and lard), supplies of which are inadequate to meet the needs of an increasing world population. On the other side, oilseed meals are rich in protein; mixed with other ingredients (e.g., cereal grains), they provide nutritionally balanced feeds

Oilseeds also provide the primary feedstock for biodiesel production. The value of oilseeds as a biodiesel feedstock depends upon a number of factors including value of fossil diesel, value of seed meal, value of glycerol, and cost of processing.

We invite investigators to contribute original research articles as well as review articles. Potential topics include, but are not limited to:

• Crop management
• Genetics and breeding
• Genomics and biotechnology
• Plant protection
• Quality and nutrition of seed oils
• Biofuels
• Economics

Before submission authors should carefully read over the journal's Author Guidelines, which are located at http://www.hindawi.com/journals/ija/guidelines/. Prospective authors should submit an electronic copy of their complete manuscript through the journal Manuscript Tracking System at http://mts.hindawi.com/ according to the following timetable: