They grow on the bark of trees, on rock or in sidewalk cracks, from tropical forests to Antarctica and the driest deserts. Mosses are everywhere. Yet "we still have little understanding of how they contribute to soil biogeochemistry, biodiversity and the environment," write the authors of a paper published this month in the journal Nature Geoscience and billed as "the world's most comprehensive field study" on the subject.
These miniature plants appeared on Earth hundreds of millions of years ago, and sometimes measuring less than a tenth of a millimeter, belong to the bryophyte family. Mosses develop through photosynthesis but "differ from other plants because they are not vascular, that is, they do not have the typical piping (called xylem and phloem) that brings water and nutrients to the plants. That's why they are very small and have to stay close to the ground.
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