Interesting facts about algae. What you did not know about aquatic plants

Seaweed is the most ancient plant on Earth. Scientists believe that their age is more than one thousand million years. Let's plunge into the world of these unique plants and learn interesting facts about them, find out how algae multiply and how they can be useful.

Brief information

There are more than 45,000 species of algae that can differ significantly in color, shape, size and habitat. They ensure the life of the aquatic environment, as they are the basis of the diet of many species of marine animals.

The first knowledge about marine plants is given us by the science of biology. Algae, their structure, can be examined in a microscope, which is what the children do in practical classes at school.

Depending on their habitat, the algae are divided into deep, which are attached to the seabed, and plankton, floating in the water column. On the ocean floor, algae can form real underwater forests.

An interesting question is how algae breed. For them can be characterized as vegetative, asexual reproduction, and sexual. Some can multiply by dividing cells, others - by the shoots of a part of the stem or by spores.

Practical use of algae for humans

It is impossible to overestimate the role of aquatic plants for humans. In seaweed, a lot of iodine, minerals and vitamins. The content is much higher than in other marine products. Therefore, many algae are used in the food industry as a useful vitamin supplement.

Algae are widely used in cosmetology. Creams and emulsions based on them have a rejuvenating, tonic, tightening effect for the skin. In many beauty parlors, a popular procedure is wrapping the whole body using natural diatoms. In this case, they are collected from the bottom of the sea, frozen, crushed and dried. The resulting powder can be used to carry out similar procedures.

Algae are used by man in the chemical industry. Of them, they can produce acetic acid, potassium salts, cellulose, alcohol. Also work is underway to obtain fuel from marine biomass.

Man has learned to use algae for biological treatment of wastewater, as an alternative to chemical cleaners.

Interesting facts about algae

No wonder algae are the very first plants on the planet. Mankind does not get tired of solving their riddles. Scientists, exploring the sea, learn all the new interesting facts about algae:

• Algae in composition of micro- and macroelements are similar in human blood.
• They do not have roots. All the substances necessary for growth are absorbed through the leaves from the water. They join the bottom or coral rhizoids.
• The science that studies algae is called algology.
• Algae is deliberately multiplied in compartments of spacecraft to create a biologically active environment.
• Even if the sea water seems clean and transparent at first sight, it also contains microscopic aquatic plants.
• A small village in Okinawa is famous for its huge number of long-livers. The reason for this is that they themselves call a large content of brown algae in the diet.
• In ancient China, seaweed was used to prevent and treat cancer.
• Aquatic plants in symbiosis with fungi form a new organism - a lichen.
• Some marine plants have luminescent properties and can glow in the dark. The glow of the sea is a very picturesque phenomenon.
• The largest alga is laminaria. Its length can reach sixty meters.
• In some high-mountainous regions a phenomenon called "watermelon snow" is known. Algae give snow a pink shade, the smell and taste of watermelon.
• There are species of marine plants that are dangerous to animals, they produce a special substance that saves them from eating fish.

The role of algae in the biosystem of our planet

Algae are the main producers of organic substances on the planet. Their share in this process is about 80%. Here are some interesting facts about algae, confirming their importance for humans and the planet as a whole:

• Algae is a food source for many animals.
• They are also the basis for the formation of some rocks: limestones, oil shales.
• Algae take part in the formation of therapeutic mud.
• They are a powerful converter of carbon dioxide to oxygen.

Why can algae save the Earth?

Few people know interesting facts about algae. And meanwhile, this topic is very entertaining. For example, there is information that these creatures can save the world. Scientists have developed a new technology that helps reduce carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere. In this case, as a filter will be used containers with water containing microalgae.

As you can see, marine plants, seemingly discreet and primitive, are a storehouse of useful substances that a person has learned to use for his own good. It is also a necessary cell in the biosystem of the planet, without which the majority of biological processes, where algae or products of their vital activity are involved, would undergo significant changes.