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Light Beyond the Bulb

Bluebells
Buckinghamshire, England


bluebells

Image Credit: Sue Vincent

When light reaches a green plant, many different reactions take place to store the energy from light into sugar (aka, carbohydrate) molecules. The plant doesn't use all of the light that it receives. Plants absorb mainly the red and blue parts of visible light from the Sun. The green color we see most often in plants is there because it is a color that the plant reflects rather than absorbs. The green leaves and grasses in this photograph, found amid this field of bluebell flowers, reflect the green range of light, whereas the bluebells reflect blue light.

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