Tamanu oil is pressed from nuts of either the Calophyllum inophyllum or the Calophyllum tacamahaca, tropical trees belonging to Calophyllaceae family. The nuts yield 70–75% of the greenish-yellow inedible oil. The oil originates in Polynesia, where it continues to play an important cultural role. Commercial uses of tamanu oil are predominantly for skin care. The oil has both medicinal value and use as a fuel.
Uses
The seeds yield a thick, dark green tamanu oil for medicinal use or hair grease. The first neoflavone isolated in 1951 from natural sources was calophyllolide from C. inophyllum seeds. The fatty acid methyl esters derived from C. inophyllumseed oil meets the major biodiesel requirements in the United States, and European Union. The average oil yield is 11.7 kg-oil/tree or 4680 kg-oil/hectare. In the northwest coastal areas of Luzon island in Philippines, the oil was used for night lamps. This widespread use started to decline when kerosene became available, and later on electricity. It was also used as fuel to generate electricity to provide power for radios during World War II. In Southern India, the oil of the seeds of the plant is used specifically for treating skin diseases. It is also applied topically in cases of rheumatism. The oil may have been useful in waterproofing cloth and is used as a varnish. An extract from the fruit was once used to make a brown dye to colour cloth. The oil can also be used to make soap. In the most of the South Sea islands, tamanu or sultan champa oil is used as an analgesic medicine and to cure ulcers and bad wounds A farmer in Nagappattinam district of Tamil Nadu has successfully used the oil as biodiesel to run his 5-hp pumpset.
takes place twice in a year in May and November. The fruit is a round, green drupe reaching 2 to 4 cm in diameter and having a single large seed. When ripe, the fruit is wrinkled and its color varies from yellow to brownish-red. The weight of the small fruit is 9 to 16.0 g when they are fresh. After drying, the weight is reduced to about 4 g. Ripe and fallen fruits are collected from the bottom of the tree, by beating the limbs with a long hand stick, or hand-picked by climbing the tree.
Kernel
The kernel part in the whole dry fruit comprises 43–52% of its weight. The kernel is 1.5 cm diameter, enclosed in a soft seed coat and a hard seed coat. The kernel contains 55–73% of oil and 25% moisture when fresh.
The seeds are decorticated by wooden mallets or by decorticators or by pressing under planks. Usually, the kernels are pressed in wooden and stone ghani.
The oil is bluish-yellow to dark green viscous, known as domba oil, or pinnai oil, or dilo oil. It has a disagreeable taste or odour, as it contains some resinous material that can easily be removed by refining. The concentration of resinous substances in the oil varies from 10 to 30%. The main compounds of the seed oil are oleic, linoleic, stearic, and palmitic acid. Physical characteristics
