Air exchange into aquarium through floating plant

[Johnn]

I'm using some salvinia auricolata in my aquarium and would like to know how air is exchanged between the roots and the emerged parts of the plants?

Do house plants that purify the air such as palms, ivy, do so by depositing airborne substances through their roots and into the soil?

Anyhow I tucked some bunches of the salvinia into holes in drift wood not knowing it was a floating plant as the Tropica instructions on the pot generically said to plant it. Wondering will its roots attach itself or purposely detach itself?

 

[Chubbs]

My experience with floating plants is that they don’t like to be wet / submerged (with the exception of their roots) for any extended period. Any that we’re submerged by my filter flow, went brown. It didn’t die completely as it would sprout new growth but the old growth was gone and would eventually need to be removed.

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

I'm using some salvinia auricolata in my aquarium and would like to know how air is exchanged between the roots and the emerged parts of the plants?

Plants have quite an extensive "plumbing system", allowing them to move gases around the plant. Have a look at <"maxing CO2.....">.

Having said that I'm not sure about <"Salvinia "auriculata group">, mainly because Salvinia spp. are ferns with very modified leaves, so the root is <"actually a third leaf in each leaf whorl">.

The main advantage of floating plants is that they have access to atmospheric gases (including 21% oxygen (O2)), and particularly 400ppm CO2.

cheers Darrel

 

[Johnn]

Was wondering whether if this is a bad thing for aquariums. Can house plants can clean air by depositing it through their roots?
'If' the floating plants work similarly in an aquarium couldn't they potentially deposit toxins from the air into your aquarium through the roots?

 

[ceg4048]

No.

Cheers,

 

[Johnn]

Any idea how gasses are exchanged in floaters between roots and leaves,
And also in house plants such as areca palm?

Areca palm can remove formaldehyde, benzene and others from the air . . .where does it go?

Thanks

 

[ceg4048]

As noted by Darrel, the plumbing system of plants allows the Oxygen produced by photosynthesis to travel down to the roots. This occurs in all plants which have roots.
Additionally, the roots themselves can uptake Oxygen and nutrients from the water.
On the underside of the leaves there are small openings called stoma (plural: stomata). Oxygen and CO2 move through these openings.

There is no mechanism by which toxic substances travel from air to roots. The movement of gases and nutrients are via specific biochemical processes.
On the contrary, toxic substance in the water, such as ammonia are pulled in by the roots and are passed on to the leaves where the plant turns them into food.
Regarding the question of "where does it go?", according to the study http://www.wolvertonenvironmental.com/Plant-Physiol-94-Giese.pdf it was determined that the formaldehyde was broken down and converted into Amino Acids, Organic Acids, Sugars and Phophate Esters.
I'm not aware of any studies concerning the ability of aquatic floating plants to assimilate volatile airborne chemicals, however, if they do have such an ability then it would be a similar biochemical pathway. There would not be a passing through from air to water as if the chemicals were moving through a straw from air to water, so I don't think you need to be concerned about this at all.

Cheers,

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

Any idea how gasses are exchanged in floaters between roots and leaves,
And also in house plants such as areca palm?

Areca palm can remove formaldehyde, benzene and others from the air . . .where does it go?

There is some scientific research on this, the terms to search for (on Google scholar) are "phytoremediation" and "volatile organic compounds" (VOC). I think this is available <"Can ornamental potted plants........">, from this study

Laboratory based studies indicate that plant induced removal of VOCs is a combination of direct (e.g. absorption) and indirect (e.g. biotransformation by microorganisms) mechanisms. They also demonstrate that plants’ rate of reducing the level of VOCs is influenced by a number of factors such as plant species, light intensity and VOC concentration. For instance, an increase in light intensity has in some studies been shown to lead to an increase in removal of a pollutant..........

cheers Darrel