Submit Manuscript | http://medcraveonline.com Introduction Commonly known as ‘false fax’ and ‘Gold of Pleasure’, Camelina sativa (L.) Crantz (Brassicaceae) is believed to be the native of northern Europe, the Mediterranean region and Central Asia. It has gained renewed interest as a biofuel feedstock. 1–3 Oil content in camelina seeds is reported in the range from 32 to 46%. 4 Camelina is favoured as an alternative feedstock for biodiesel production due to its low cost in comparison to commodity oils. 5 Moreover, the fuel properties including cold fow properties, oxidative stability, kinematic viscosity and cetane number of biodiesel made from camelina are similar to those of the soybean-based biodiesel 6 and canola. 3 Recently, camelina oil-based jet fuel has been developed and test fights of different passenger aircrafts as well as fghter jets have been successfully conducted. 5 These facts clearly indicate the suitability of camelina oil for making biofuels. Moreover, because of its unique nutritive properties, camelina meal has been identifed as a high-value animal feed. 7 Thus it holds high economic potential. Such a high economic value of camelina meal has tremendous potential in ensuring camelina biodiesel economically more viable. Growing environments infuence quality and quantity of seed and oil yield of oilseed crops. 8 therefore it is important to develop region-specifc production technologies for a newly introduced crop in a particular agro-climatic region. Identifcation of nutrients requirement is one of the important factors that need to be standardized for such crop. In order to avoid food versus fuel confict, it is advocated that biofuel crops should be grown on degraded lands, which are generally not suitable for growing other agricultural foods crops as they either cannot grow or exhibit poor growth and low production in such soils. In view of this, and because of its wide adaptability to different climates and soils. 9,10 Camelina seems to be a potential biofuel crop. This is particularly important in the Indian context, where degraded lands in the semi-arids are widely available and are more or less underutilized due to unavailability of a suitable low input crop. Camelina seems to be a potential candidate crop for this region being short duration, drought tolerant and low input requiring. Realizing the potential, the crop has already been introduced in India and found successful in central Himalayan region. 11 Efforts are been made for assessing its adaptability and developing agro-technologies for in semi-arid zones of India. However, fertilization and agronomic requirements of the crop for such agro- ecological regions need to be standardized for obtaining optimal yields. In general, oilseed crops have a much higher requirement for sulphur for attaining optimum growth and yield vis-à-vis quality and quantity of oil. s Plant use effciency of nitrogen from fertilizers is inhibited by defciency of Sulfur. 13 That may cause increased losses of nitrogen. 14 Therefore, fertilizers containing Sulfur seem to be effective in camelina nutrition and subsequently in obtaining copious seed and oil yield. In addition to mineral fertilizers, organic fertilizers play a vital role in increasing soil fertility and productivity thereby increasing the yield in sustainable manner. Organic matter supplied in the form of farmyard manure (FYM), green manure or compost to the soil is considered as the most important factor for enhancing crop productivity. 15 As it positively affects physical, chemical and biological properties of soil. 16 The objectives of the study were to evaluate the effect of Sulfur and organic fertilizer on plant growth, seed yield and oil content in camelina in the degraded land of hot semi-arid zone of Deccan Plateau, India. Adv Plants Agric Res. 2017;7(3):305‒309. 305 © 2017 Joshi et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and build upon your work non-commercially. Growth and yield response of camelina sativa to inorganic fertilizers and farmyard manure in hot semi-arid climate of India Volume 7 Issue 3 - 2017 Soumai Kant Joshi, Sharif Ahamada, Lekha Charan Meher, Ankur Agarwal, Mohammed Nasim Defence Institute of Bio-Energy Research, India Correspondence: Ankur Agarwal, Defence Institute of Bio- Energy Research, Goraparao, Haldwani- 263 139, Uttarakhand, India, Tel +91 5946232800; Fax +91 5946232719, Email ankurdr@rediffmail.com Received: October 12, 2016 | Published: July 07, 2017 Abstract Camelina [Camelina sativa L. (Crantz)], a potential alternative oilseed crop of family Brassicaceae, has gained renewed interests as a feedstock for biodiesel production. Effect of sulphur (0, 10, 20 and 30kg ha -1 ) and farmyard manure (FYM) (20 and 30tons ha -1 ) on plant growth, seed yield and oil content of camelina in degraded land of hot semi-arid climate was studied during the winter season (November to February). Both Sulfur and organic fertilizer neither significantly (P<0.05) influenced plant growth nor yield attributes nor even seed oil content of camelina. However, addition of N and P2O5 exhibited significant (P<0.05) increase growth and seed yield including seed oil content over control. Maximum seed yield (72.2g m-2) was recorded in treatment combination comprising 30 tons FYM, 20kg S, 60kg P2O5 and 100kg N ha -1 . Seed oil content, ranged from 29.1 to 32.5%. Quality of seed oil of camelina (grown at the hot semi-arid climate) was also assessed by analyzing the patterns of fatty acids composition. Results indicated that camelina can be successfully cultivated in the degraded land of hot semi-arid zone during the winter season that too in a short growing period. Considerable seed yield and oil content as well as corresponding fatty acid profile of camelina oil reported in this study indicated promising potentials for its suitability for the hot semi-arid regions. However, it would be pertinent to further identify growth and production requirements for the crop in order to strengthen baseline data on its agronomic attributes for ensuring its efficient cultivation on degraded lands of hot semi-arid region. Keywords: camelina, biofuel crops, biodiesel, organic manure, sulfur fertilization Advances in Plants & Agriculture Research Research Article Open Access