Botany and Society

• Botany and Society
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  The explosive growth of human populationis changing the earth dramatically.
  Only by understanding how human activities affect our environment can we predict global climatic changes.
  Scientific studies of these changes and their effect on natural ecosystems and crop production are crucial to the future of our society.
  Other environmental issues, such as pollution, also interest botanists.
  
  Many plant species are especially sensitive to certain pollutants. Botanists study the effects of different types of pollution on plants. They use their results to advise lawmakers on legislation for environmental protection and on ways to save priceless natural areas.
  
  By using plant tissue culture, botanists can grow entire plants from single cells.
  This has exciting potential in biotechnology, horticulture, forestry, and plant pathology.
  
  Plants are chemical factories-
  
  Many of the chemicals that they produce are useful to humans.
  
  Besides food, plants provide raw materials for paper, building materials, solvents and adhesives, fabrics, medicines, and many other products.
  Botanists study the chemicals produced by different plants to find new uses for them.
  
  For example, we use some plant chemicals to treat certain types of cancer.
  
  The earth's biological diversity, or the kinds of organisms that populate the earth,is decreasing. As humans change the environment for their own purposes, plants and animals living in these areas become increasingly endangered.
  Plant taxonomists and plant ecologists work to identify and understand new plant species, especially in such biologically rich areas as tropical rain forests.
  Plants of the rain forests are important in their own right, but they could be major new resources for people as well.
  Perhaps a plant as yet undiscovered will become an important food crop.
  There are probably many undiscovered plants that produce useful drugs to cure or treat human diseases.
  Biological diversity also provides an important source of new genes to improve the plants we now use.
  As techniques of genetic engineering improve, so will our ability to improve our domestic plants.