We know that plants purify the air, but now it has been shown that they destroy carcinogenic compounds from pollution.
A study carried out by the University of Technology Sydney has shown that lower plants kill off carcinogenic toxins from the environment within hours. Tests have focused on compounds produced by gasoline and car emissions.
Gas stations generate gasoline vaporand cars emit various carcinogenic compounds from petroleumthrough the exhaust pipes.
Many people have air purifiers at home, but these devices are not effective on gaseous emissions, such as gasoline vapor.
For a plant in your house, it will eat the carcinogenic particles
Few people know that the air is more polluted indoors than outdoors. At home, at school, at work, pollution accumulates and remains floating in the environment, and we breathe it. This causes from respiratory diseases, cancer.
The aforementioned gasoline vapor and the combustion process of the cars release carcinogenic compounds such as benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylenewhich are known as BTEXby their initials, as explained by New Atlas.
The researchers created different walls filled with houseplants, such as devil ivy (Epipremnus aureum), arrowhead vine (Syngonium podophyllum) y spider plant (Chlorophytum comosum), and subjected them to the aforementioned compounds.
The results left them speechless. The plants devoured 97.9% of the alkanes, 85.96% of the benzene, and 88.18% of the cyclopentane.. In just 8 hours they had already destroyed 80% of all these compounds.
“This is the first time that the ability of plants to remove petroleum-related compounds has been tested, and the results are astounding,” says bioremediation researcher Fraser Torpy, who led the study.
Also removed the most harmful compounds first: “Plants can not only remove most pollutants from the air in a matter of hours, they also act more effectively on the most harmful ones; for example, the well-known carcinogen benzene is digested at a faster rate than less harmful substances, such as the alcohols.”
And also, the more polluted the air was, the faster they acted. “We also found that the more concentrated the toxins were in the air, the faster and more effective the plants were at removing them, showing that they adapt to the conditions in which they grow,” says Torpy.
we knew that plants purify the air, and now it has been shown that destroy carcinogenic compounds derived from petroleum. And also do it actively: they attack the most dangerous first, and faster as there are more toxins. Do you need more reasons to put indoor plants at home?
