In recent years, the interest in finding environmentally friendly or green biodegradablernmaterials derived from natural resources as alternatives to non-biodegradable petroleumbasedrnpolymers has increased dramatically. Vernonia galamensis is a native plant ofrnEthiopia whose seeds contain a significant concentration of a unique naturally epoxidisedrntriglyceride oil. This type of moiety is particularly useful as a cross-linking agent andrnsynthetic building blocks and therefore, vernonia oil offers great potential for numerousrnapplications. This thesis explores the synthetic possibilities of vernonia oil in order to tryrnto maximise the prospects for its industrialisation.rnFor this study, native vernonia galamensis seeds obtained from Haromaya University andrnAdet Agricultural Center were used. All the products obtained from vernonia oil arernshown in Figure 1.rnrnFigure 1: Schematic representations of derivatives of vernonia oilrnThe extracted vernonia oil, vernolic acid, vernonia oil methyl ester and vernanol wererncharacterized using 1H NMR, 13C NMR, FTIR, MALDI-TOF MS, and TGA. The oilrncontent of the plant and the concentration of the epoxy moiety were assessed. Thernvernonia oil derivatives such as vernolic acid, vernonia oil methyl ester, vernanol, werernused as precursors in the synthesis of various value added products.rnOne of the major objectives of this thesis is to conduct preliminary studies for thernsynthesis of polymeric materials using sugar fatty esters containing an epoxy group as thernrnstarting material. New epoxy starch and epoxy glucose fatty acid esters were prepared byrnesterification and transesterification reactions employing different reaction conditions,rnusing both chemical and enzymatic synthesis and organic solvents and/or ionic liquids asrnsolvents. Most of the products were found to be insoluble in NMR solvents, whichrncomplicated their characterisation. However, they were successfully characterised using arnlarge array of techniques such as solid state NMR, FTIR, MS, DSC, TGA, powder XRDrnand SEM. All techniques confirmed the esterification of the sugars in a different degreernof substitution, which were evaluated via titration methods. The stability of the epoxyrngroup under the different experimental conditions was also evaluated. The degree ofrnsubstitution and presence of epoxy group could also be related to properties such as thernthermal stability or the morphology of the sample. The data collected helped to identifyrnthe most useful synthetic methods for further testing.rnRing opening polymerisations of vernonia oil and vernonia oil methyl ester were alsornsuccessfully carried out. These studies contain useful information that will be used in thernfuture work for the design of the polymerisation reactions of the epoxidized sugar esters.rnDifferent modifications of vernonia oil and its derivatives were performed in order tornincrease the scope of applications of materials available from vernonia oil. These includernepoxidation of vernonia oil, preparation of vernonia oil polyol and hydroxylation ofrnVOME. In all cases, 1H NMR, 13C NMR, FTIR, ESI-MS results obtained confirmed thernsynthesis of the intended products.