Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

This article comes from the official account of Wechat: SF Chinese (ID:kexuejiaodian), article: Sery Perkins (Ceri Perkins), translated by Merlin, edited by Zhao Jiaming

Some studies have shown that the concentration of indoor harmful substances can reach more than 5 times that of outdoor.

We can often see some such as "green plants must not be placed casually" and "help stickers!" the contents of several "detoxification" plants that most people do not know, and even some health media list "10 kinds of green plants with the strongest ability to purify the air".

In addition, in the past two years, due to the impact of the epidemic, we spent more time indoors, and many of our friends paid more attention to indoor air quality and began to set up green plants all over their homes.

So, is it good to have green plants at home? Is there any scientific basis for this statement?

What exactly does Green Plant purify? Only by knowing yourself and knowing the enemy can you win a hundred battles.

Before we answer whether green plants can purify the air, we need to know who is the "enemy" of green plants.

According to NASA's research, green plants mainly purify harmful substances known as "volatile organic compounds" (volatile organic compounds, abbreviated as VOCs).

Formaldehyde as we know it is a typical representative of VOCs.

According to the definition of the US Federal Environmental Protection Agency, all the carbon compounds that can participate in atmospheric photochemical reactions are VOCs except carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, carbonic acid, metal carbide, metal carbonate and ammonium carbonate.

Perhaps friends will feel that these substances seem to have been seen in high school chemistry textbooks, it seems that it is no big deal.

You are wrong about this. According to the survey, more than 20 million deaths worldwide each year are directly related to them.

Even if there is no death, according to some research institutions, when the concentration of VOCs is very low, it may make people feel uncomfortable.

If the concentration of indoor VOCs continues to rise, it will cause headaches, symptoms of neurotoxicity such as nausea and memory impairment, and even serious diseases such as tumors, especially in some closed and narrow indoor environments.

Cooking is one of the main sources of indoor VOCs. In Guatemala, this traditional way of cooking produces a lot of VOCs. (photo source: gringologue / Flickr) it helps, but not much. Sources of VOCs can be found everywhere in our homes-furniture, paint, plastic products, wooden floors, kitchens, etc. Now that we know, the main enemy of indoor green plants is VOCs.

Can the green plant really purify the VOCs in the air?

Unfortunately, it works, but it doesn't work much.

According to research by NASA since 1989, green plants do purify indoor air (in a closed environment).

Scientists have found that some species of green plants can purify up to 70 per cent of experimental VOCs after 24 hours.

But this does not mean that in the real indoor environment (such as our home or office environment), green plants can really effectively purify the air.

According to a scientific review published in 2019, NASA conducted 11 more studies over the past few decades: in a closed environment, scientists blew VOCs to green plants with fans and then collected them with carbon filters to measure the level of VOCs purification by green plants.

In other words, such experimental settings do not exist in our real life. After all, there are some "special settings" in the experimental research, which are still different from our real life.

Is it really useless to put green plants? You may have noticed that in NASA's studies, the experiments were carried out in a closed environment-the green plants were placed in small sealed containers.

In the places where we work and live, such a sealed environment is impossible.

In other words, NASA's experimental results cannot be "replicated" into real life.

But it can't be said that putting green plants indoors has no effect at all. According to NASA researchers, if you can put 10 to 1000 green plants on every square meter of ground in your home, maybe the green plants can purify VOCs at a rate that can catch up with the rate of indoor and outdoor air circulation through gas exchange.

Because in the home and the place of work, the air can always be circulated indoors and outdoors, so that air pollutants can continue to enter the room.

Although green plants play little role in purifying indoor air, the study found that green plants have some other values.

For example, green plants can regulate indoor humidity; in indoor, putting green plants can improve people's mood, and then improve work efficiency; green plants can also beautify the indoor environment. If you still want to improve indoor air quality, you'd better buy an air purifier with better filtration performance.

In addition, if the outdoor air quality in your area is good, you can also open windows and ventilate properly.

The green plant completes gas exchange through the stomata in the leaves. For example, in photosynthesis, carbon dioxide in the air enters the leaves through stomata, while oxygen produced by plants is discharged into the air through stomata. With the gas exchange, some air pollutants (such as VOCs) also enter the blade through stomata. Green plants purify the air in this way. (photo Source: h McKenna) Green plants cause carbon dioxide poisoning? As we mentioned earlier, green plants purify the air through gas exchange.

See this, some friends may have to worry: respiration is a process of green plant gas exchange, in respiration, green plants will release carbon dioxide, then if you put a lot of green plants in the bedroom, when you sleep at night, will it cause carbon dioxide poisoning?

In fact, don't worry at all, it's just a "rumor".

In fact, when you turn off the lights and sleep, the photosynthesis of green plants almost stops due to the lack of energy from the light source, but respiration continues all the time.

Through respiration, green plants do continue to release carbon dioxide.

However, there is no problem at all. Because the size of green plants determines how much carbon dioxide they release.

Studies have shown that all kinds of green plants are too small and emit much less carbon dioxide than human breathing.

Therefore, we do not have to worry about putting green plants in the bedroom will lead to carbon dioxide poisoning, after all, we are not "poisoned" by the carbon dioxide we exhale.

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