Why are bryophytes considered as bioindicators?
Bryophytes are reliable indicators and monitors of air pollution as they are easy to handle and show a vast range of specific sensitivity and visible symptoms to pollutants greatly exceeding that of higher plants. KEY WORDS: Bryophyte, bio-indicator, air pollution, pollutants.
Why bryophytes are considered as excellent indicators of pollution?
Bryophyte proves to be a potential bio-indicator of air pollution. The habitat diversity, structural simplicity, totipotency, rapid rate of multiplication and high metal accumulation capacity make bryophytes an ideal organism for pollution studies.
How are bryophytes used as monitoring agents?
Aquatic bryophytes can be used to assess freshwater pollution as indicators – presence or absence of species – or as monitors for accumulating elements. Consumption of metals and other substances by aquatic bryophytes is an important exposure pathway for consumers.
What are the ecological importance of bryophytes?
Bryophytes also play a very important role in the environment: they colonize sterile soils, absorb nutrients and water and release them slowly back into the ecosystem, contributing to the formation of soil for new plants to grow on.
What are fossil bryophytes?
Fossil Bryophyta (Mosses): ® The fossil record of the mosses is much less. complete as compared to the fossil hepatics, though they are recorded as early as the Permian. ® An impression of a leafy shoot of Muscites.
What are the features of bryophytes?
General Characteristics of Bryophytes:
- Plants occur in damp and shaded areas.
- The plant body is thallus like, i.e. prostrate or erect.
- It is attached to the substratum by rhizoids, which are unicellular or multicellular.
- They lack true vegetative structure and have a root-like, stem-like and leaf-like structure.
What defines a bryophyte?
Definition of bryophyte : any of a division (Bryophyta) of nonflowering plants comprising the mosses, liverworts, and hornworts.
What are bryophytes used for?
Bryophyte are used as indicator species, erosion control, bioindicators of heavy metals in air pollution, aquatic bioindicators, radioactivity indicators, as material for seed beds, fuel, medicines and food sources, pesticides, nitrogen fixation, moss gardening, treatment of waste, construction, clothing, furnishing.
When did bryophytes evolve?
some 475 million years ago
Bryophytes appeared some 475 million years ago and were the first plants to colonize the land.
What is the origin of bryophytes?
Bryophyte origin is part of the rise of terrestrial, vascularized, plants with sporopollenin-walled spores in the Silurian. Before the end of Carboniferous time, bryophyte lines were widely present.