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By increasing the oil in tobacco plant leaves, researchers may have turned the health-hazardous crop into the ideal biofuel.

(FOXNews.com) - Researchers from the Biotechnology Foundation Laboratories at Thomas Jefferson University have identified a way to increase the oil in tobacco plant leaves, which may be the next step in using the plants for biofuel. Their paper was published online in Plant Biotechnology Journal.

According to Vyacheslav Andrianov, assistant professor of Cancer Biology at Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University, tobacco can generate biofuel more efficiently than other agricultural crops. However, most of the oil is typically found in the seeds: Tobacco seeds are composed of about 40 percent oil per dry weight.

Although the seed oil has been tested for use as fuel for diesel engines, tobacco plants yield a modest amount of seeds, at only about 1,325 pounds of seeds per acre. Andrianov and his colleagues sought to find ways to engineer tobacco plants, so that their leaves expressed the oil.