All language subtitles for Invisible.Nature.Series.1.1of3.Colonizing.Plants.1080p.HDTV.x264.AAC.MVGroup.org.eng

This bizarre world, with its many hairs,

is in appearance very similar
to a forest of baobabs.

Pores seem to open like
hungry little mouths.

As strange as it may seem,

this invisible nature is
quite familiar to you.

This is the surface of a leaf,

magnified hundreds of times using

the latest developments
in electron microscopy.

A technical feat achieved
for the first time.

Here, sap progresses in
the veins of a leaf.

An ejection of seeds is
slowed down 2000 times,

because plants are anything but motionless.

Plants have conquered all environments,

volcanic lands, dry deserts, estuaries,

ice and snow,

and even the asphalt of our cities.

Deprived of legs, they have invented

various forms of sexuality in
order to conquer the world.

Their strategies have
enabled them to take root

in the most extreme places on the planet.

This is probably what our world looked like

460 million years ago,

when the first land plants appeared.

A land covered with pools
of acid hot springs,

with temperatures rising
to 90 degrees Celsius.

Despite such heat, some plants can grow.

Around almost every hot spring, you'll find

grasses of varying types growing
up against the hot water.

The high temperature water
cools off very rapidly

such that these plants can
grow in these environments.

But there are some plants that
are very, very interesting.

One known as its scientific
name is Dichanthelium,

but its more generic name
is Hot Springs Panic Grass.

Looks like weeds in my front yard,

but it's this grass right there

with the purple edges to the grass leaves.

This particular plant has a fungus growing

associated with its roots,

and researchers at Montana State University

have shown that this fungus
relationship with this plant

is what allows this plant to grow

at these higher temperatures

and tolerate high temperatures.

The mechanism is not yet known,

but somehow, this fungus is imparting

some protective measure
or causing the plant

to react some way that
allows it to protect itself

from these higher temperatures.

Next to the acid hot springs,

plant roots grow on the surface

to optimize the capture of oxygen.

They have also developed the capacity

to withstand the heavy metals present

in these hostile environments.

Plants get their energy from the sun.

Scientists call this photosynthesis.

Algae are the first plants

that appeared at the
beginning of life on Earth.

Unable to leave their aquatic environment,

they are already masters of photosynthesis.

When the temperature drops,

algae produce colored substances and sugars

that act as an antifreeze.

Some algae will even accept to be swallowed

by gelatinous organisms, whose envelope

will protect them from extreme cold.

During the brief summer
season of Spitsbergen,

an archipelago near Greenland,
the sun never sets.

It shines 24 hours a day,

an ideal season to study
the growing vegetation.

The Earth's crust will thaw in summer

but remains low in minerals.

This severely limits the rate of growth

and density of the vegetation.

Wherever there's a form of shelter,

where seeds accumulate,
where sediments accumulate,

we immediately have
vegetation that settles in.

Here's a typical and pretty area of Drias

that is growing.

The plants, once rooted,
will try to gain ground.

We can see it here, for example.

So basically, the goal is to hang on,

then gain inches, bit by bit.

Just how do these plants colonize

such cold, bare lands?

To succeed, they group together,

which enables them to store
what little heat is available,

an efficient way of
conquering the surroundings.

Some of the plants that live
here are over 100 years old.

There are two explanations for this.

The first is being able to resist

the wind and cold temperatures.

And they do this by growing in clusters.

The second is the plants' compost.

Plants that die leave their own fertilizer,

their own organic matter,
for those who come after.

The generations of plants

that die on this spot here form
fresh Earth on the surface.

The grouping of plants serves

as a breeding ground for other plants,

such as the hairy lousewort.

The plant is well acclimatized.

It produces a hairy, feathery lining

to protect it against the cold.

The lining is so tight,
it acts as insulation

and plays an important role

in the screening of harmful sun rays.

The edelweiss uses the same technique.

Its flowers are protected by a duvet,

a strategy used by many plants

to avoid being naked in the cold.

This technique is also used
to protect plants from heat,

like this cactus.

Microscopic hairs allow
plants to retain water

necessary for their survival.

Some of them are shaped like anchors

for catching droplets.

Each form of hair is perfectly adapted

to a particular environment.

The most developed and
most dense vegetation

is located in an even
more extreme environment,

steep, sharp cliffs.

Oh, look over there. Can you see?

Between the zones of scree,

where rocks have fallen,

at the foot of the pillars there.

You have an area covered in green.

Let's go and take a look.

We're going over to the steep area.

We don't really know what
type of terrain we'll meet,

probably very unstable.

There are zones of really high erosion.

It's a very steep slope there.

It's very unstable.

To study biodiversity,

you really need to reach the ecosystem,

and some are not easy to get to.

But that can also be the reward,

taking risks to get to places

that nobody has observed.

This whole area is an
extreme within an extreme.

Well, this is unexpected,
very unexpected.

Here we have plants that are in fruit,

or even in flower.

How do these plants find organic matter

in such an inhospitable environment?

Finding plants at a more developed stage

here, hanging on a cliff
at 100 meters of altitude,

is really surprising.

At the same time, it's not a mystery.

We're just below a bird colony,

so basically their food falls from the sky.

Here we have guano that brings nitrogen,

the nutrient material which also allows

a whole host of bacteria,
plants, mosses and lichens

to colonize this environment.

Lichens are a combination

of algae and fungi that
fragment in order to multiply.

It may take them 50 years to
cover one square centimeter.

Within the lichen, the fungus
filaments capture water

and minerals and provide
protection for the algae.

The algae captures light for photosynthesis

and brings energy to the fungus.

Symbiosis is their force.

Other plants have invented
more radical solutions

in order to survive in
nutrient poor environments.

Venus Flytraps naturally live

on the border of North and South Carolina

in the Southeast part of the United States.

This is the only place in the world

that they are naturally found.

It's an area of about 20 square miles

or about 40 square kilometers.

Why aren't all plants carnivorous?

The answer is both simple and complicated.

On the simple side, first
off, really we can say

that all plants really are carnivorous,

because all plants get
minerals and nutrients

through their roots.

And those minerals and nutrients
are basically made up

of dead animals that have rotted
and decomposed in the soil,

and the plants are sucking those up.

But the kinds of carnivorous
plants that we see

where the leaves have actually
changed shape to make traps,

this is very different.

And this is an accident of evolution

that probably happened about
50 million years ago.

It actually happened about six times

among the entire plant kingdom.

And some plants, those plants growing in

very nutrient poor conditions,

evolved a particular mutation to allow them

to capture insects and extract
the minerals and nutrients

directly from the insects.

How do these plants catch insects?

How do they move so fast without
having muscles and nerves?

The Venus Flytrap is taking the energy

that's stored in water,
pumping it out very quickly

to close the trap and then
re-pumping that water

back in to reset the trap.

It's at the hinge of the trap

that cells fill with water,

causing the closure of the lobes.

These tiny hairs trigger the trap.

When prey successfully
touches two sensory hairs

within 20 seconds, it
activates the death trap

that immediately closes.

For the plant, the advantage is obvious.

A small twig will not action
the trap for nothing.

Only the agitation of an insect is likely

to trigger a second hair.

The sensitivity of the hairs
is so finely adjusted

that the fall of raindrops
will not trigger the trap.

How does the plant manage
to each such large prey?

Carnivorous plants are not only mouths,

but also stomachs.

They use these multiple red enzymes

to reduce their prey to a pulp.

The plant secretes
enzymes, just like people

have digestive enzymes in their stomachs

that dissolve the insect.

And then the plant just
absorbs all the nutrients

in the juices that were left

from the dissolved insect.

Carnivorous plants only digest

the soft flesh of their prey.

All that remains is the
insect's exoskeleton.

It takes a Venus flytrap
about three to five days

to completely digest an ant
or a fly that it has caught.

The Venus flytrap will only dine

three or four times in its life

before turning black and wilting.

Most carnivorous plants live in swamps,

happily obliging Aaron Ellison

to use his homemade kayak to approach them.

Sundews, or plants a lot like sundews,

are probably the most
primative or ancient type

of carnivorous plant.

This sort of pattern of a sticky trap,

then a more complicated trap having evolved

has occurred at least five or six times

in all of the plant kingdom.

Sundews are the primitive group,

followed next in their
evolutionary sequence

by the Asian pitcher plants,

and followed next in the
evolutionary sequence

by Venus flytraps.

It may be primitive,

but this glue trap is highly efficient.

Each ball glows in the sun like a dewdrop

and acts as a magnet to attract insects.

It contains a powerful sticky glue.

Any insect that lands is stuck
with no chance of escape.

The efforts of this fly to
escape its trap are in vain.

Once immobilized, it will be dissolved

by round enzymes along the stem.

Pitcher plants are considered advanced

as carnivorous plants go, because they have

a variety of methods that they use

to both attract and trap
and digest insects.

The pitcher plant has these hairs

that point downward so that when the insect

tries to crawl back up, it gets caught

in these hairs and falls
further into the plant.

The inside of the pitcher is coated

with a very, very fine wax

that allows the pitcher plants to act

like a sliding board for the insects

to slide down into the very bottom

where they're captured and digested.

The electron microscope

reveals this amazing forest of hair,

all pointing in the same direction,

stopping any prey from climbing out.

Other species have replaced
hairs by small tiles,

in which insects' legs become trapped.

Some hairs are even equipped
with glue on their tip.

Carnivorous plants have evolved to adapt

according to varying
sizes and types of prey.

There are over 500 varieties
of carnivorous plants

that live in swamps.

But some are not where
you'd expect them to be.

Faster than a Venus flytrap,

more powerful than the best mousetrap,

it's the bladderwort.

And if you pull it up, it
looks just like any other

green, limp algae that you would find

in the pond anywhere.

But put this under a microscope,

and a whole new world of plant life

will become visible.

These carnivorous plants

capture zooplankton using
a bag-shaped trap.

Equipped with a valve
that closes at a speed

of 10 to 15 milliseconds.

But unlike above surface carnivores,

they do not have digestive glands.

How do they digest living prey?

Bladderworts have made a
pact with smaller than them,

tiny protazoas.

It doesn't take long for an army of them

to decompose the prey.

The bladderwort enables the protozoa

to feed on large prey that they would be

unable to catch alone.

And the protozoa break down

essential digestive nutrients
for the bladderwort.

It's microscopic symbiosis.

Once fed, the plant can now
grow this magnificent flower.

Plants use energy to build structures.

Just like people invest
money in businesses,

plants invest carbon in structures.

We expected that a complicated structure

like a carnivorous plant trap,

like the trap of a Venus flytrap,

would take a lot of carbon to build.

To our surprise, the results
of our research showed

that for a normal leaf that takes about

a gram and a half of carbon

to make every gram of leaf.

In contrast, these very
elaborate, very complicated

carnivorous traps that we had assumed,

we had always assumed were
very expensive to produce,

turn out to be really cheap.

On about average, 20 to 25% less expensive,

less energetically costly to make

than are the leaves of a normal plant.

If people were designing a Venus flytrap,

they would come up with a
system of pumps and pulleys

and engines that would require
a lot of fossil fuels

to drive that, as opposed to thinking about

how they could just simply take
the energy stored in water,

squeeze that energy out, and
then reuse that energy again

from the water to reset the trap.

And so plants like Venus
flytraps have a lot to teach us.

We see a lot of really
large carnivorous plants

in science fiction movies.

But carnivorous plants really
couldn't grow that big.

Oy, what I did?

All the big plants, the things like trees,

have lots of support structures,

bark, wood, trunks.

Carnivorous plants are herbs.

They don't make wood,

so a really, really large carnivorous plant

would have so large an energetic demand

simply to hold itself up

that there wouldn't be
enough left for the traps.

If some carnivorous plants

have turned their leaves into insect traps,

others simply capture water,

another way of adapting to
the surrounding environment.

Tillandsia grows mainly in treetops

and lives on raindrops, the
secret of its survival.

Water is trapped in tiny cups,

which line the walls of the plant.

They act like buckets.

This rootless plant can
absorb and retain water

required for growth.

Splashing from leaf to leaf,

the water droplets deliver rare minerals

the plant needs for growth.

Unlike Tillandsia, the
hypersensitive leaves

of mimosa pudica will
close to protect against

weather or herbivorous predators.

A single drop of water can
trigger this movement.

The closure is caused by little red balls

that inflate like tiny airbags

when the leaf feels a contact.

Plant leaves are covered
with a network of veins.

They have as many different
ramification patterns

as there are fingerprints in humans.

Eleni Katifori is a leaf specialist.

What we want to understand is

whether the environment or
the particular conditions

have an effect on the
architecture of the venation,

because we see a variety
of plants in the desert

or in the Arctic, or in
wet or dry conditions,

and we see a variety of architectures.

We want to understand if
there is any correlation

between the environment,
where the plant lives

and the architecture of the venation.

This tree, in the heart of

New York's Central Park, is a ginkgo.

It is amongst the oldest species on Earth.

In revolutionary ancient times,

most plants were like
ginkgo, very primitive.

Today, most of the plants
you're going to see

have very complex venation,
very sophisticated.

And the reason for this is that ginkgos,

which used to cover a very
big part of the planet,

were out competed by the
more sophisticated plants

that can do photosynthesis
more efficiently.

To study the evolution of its veins,

Eleni damages the ginkgo leaf

by piercing a hole in its center.

Using ultraviolet light
and optical filters,

Eleni has developed a method.

This liquid is a marker,
and by absorbing it,

the leaf will gradually
reveal its structure.

Ginkgo has a very primitive vein network.

It has no loops.

When we create an injury,
when we punch a hole,

the water cannot bypass the injury site,

and that part of the leaf will die.

Modern plants have evolved loops.

And with the help of
loops, water can bypass

any injury site and eventually
fill up the whole leaf.

And this is the secret for
survival for modern plants

when there is damage.

This modern network of veins

enables plants to adapt to all conditions

with very low energy expenditure.

Leaves and leaf venation
might still be evolving.

We don't know.

Plants are still competing with each other,

and maybe in hundreds of millions of years

they will have different
and maybe more efficient

patterns of leaf veins.

The bodies of plants have evolved

through evolution.

Without legs, they have succeeded

in colonizing all environments

through inventive sexuality.

Plants have three ways of reproducing,

sexless by auto producing young plants,

self-fertilization, by sex between

their own male and female organs,

remote sex, with pollen,
an extraordinary invention

that enables them to reproduce without ever

meeting a companion.

The sperm is protected
within a simple capsule

that will enable them to travel

from flower to flower with the help

of an insect, a bird or
a mammal pollinator.

If you cannot deliver your own pollen,

you have no choice but to
trust it to someone else.

The plant provides nectar as a reward.

Pollen grains are quite diverse

to an extent that you can recognize species

based on the morphology
of the pollen grain,

very much like the
fingerprints for human beings.

So, if you talk about
250,000 species of plants,

there are that many, or
almost that many number

of pollen shapes, if you will.

And these maybe can be quite diverse.

It's one of the great
mysteries of plant biology,

why they are so diverse.

Some possible explanations
would be, in fact,

adaptation to slightly
different conditions.

There's an initial prototype or initial

pollen grain morphology that has evolved,

and these has then diversified.

Under extreme conditions,

pollen can survive several days.

It has the power to
retain its water content.

But just how do they achieve this?

Doctor Jacques Dumais has
found an explanation

by observing the structure of pollen

with a scanning electron microscope.

Pollen is an amazing structure.

It's a small structure that could dehydrate

extremely fast when it's released.

And it's in fact quite a
feat, given their size.

Most small cells would shrivel and dry out

within minutes under most conditions.

And what it does to protect itself,

it folds on itself, just like origami,

and becomes sealed and therefore can travel

a great distance without losing water.

Jacques Dumais continues his investigation

of ferns in the large greenhouses located

on the rooftops of Harvard Forest,

an offshoot of the famous
Harvard University.

He is particularly interested in sporangia,

the reproductive organs of the fern.

Using a high speed camera
to film sporangia,

at 2000 frames per second,

he has discovered their
technique of ejection.

The catapult system is
really a great inspiration.

In fact, was evolved millions
of years before humans

ever thought of the catapult.

It evolved in these ferns
to release their spores

and make sure that they can be dispersed

over great distances.

Relying solely on inside forces,

this is also the case of the geranium,

which expulses its seeds
over more than one meter,

or wild cucumber, which
holds the seed throwing

world record, at almost ten meters.

To optimize seedlings'
chances for survival,

seeds need to move away
from the parent plant.

Too close, and competition
for light and water

could make life difficult for them.

Agrimonia and burdock
thistles have invented velcro

to hike a lift on the
back of passing animals.

Under the eye of the electron microscope,

we can see that each
burdock spike has a hook,

a hook that enables the seed to cling on

to the fur of the animal.

Velcro copies this idea with two bands

that grip to each other.

One side covered with tiny hooks,

the other with small loops.

The seed of erodium has a beak and a tail.

It will screw into the ground

through the movement of its tail,

that wraps or unwraps
according to humidity levels.

Drilling mechanisms were invented by plants

a long time ago.

There's quite a diversity
of mechanisms that are

out there that some of them have been

rediscovered by humans.

Some of them have yet to be rediscovered.

The dandelion is using a strategy

that guarantees almost certain dispersal.

If you're relying on animals to come by,

or things like that,

you're somewhat dependent
on your environment.

Wind is by and large always present,

at least in some amount,

and can bring you to great distances

if it's strong enough.

To colonize the world like the dandelion,

most seeds choose wind,

where they use different tricks

like a parachute or helicopter blades.

This truly is bioengineering.

By dispersing in millions,

seeds in pollen can
accomplish vast distances.

To grow and conquer, they must find

new and suitable environments,

including our cities.

They are so good at traveling,

that 55% of all species
found in the Northeast

of the USA are present in
the heart of New York.

60% of the entire flora of Great Britain

is found in London.

With their ability to infiltrate cracks

and their resistance to aggressions,

plants are colonizing our cities.

Certain invasive plants can come

from far, far away.

Invasive plants do not only
rely on wind to travel.

With the explosion of globalization,

they now take airplanes and boats

to reach the continents
they would not ordinarily

be able to reach.

The Chinese tree of heaven

and the Japanese knotweed
have invaded our cities.

Professor Florence Piola focuses on the

strategies of knotweed to
crowd out native plants.

Knotweeds have an extremely

rigorous rhizome that grows very fast,

several meters a year.

And a small fragment of
rhizome can relocate

a short distance away, giving
a new individual plant.

Knotweeds are also masters
of chemical warfare.

They secrete molecules in the soil

that poison other plants.

Weakened by toxins, the native plants

do not grow as fast as they usually would,

and the invasive plant proliferates.

In Europe, the Japanese knotweed plants

arrive with a chemical cocktail

that European plants ignore.

Whereas in Japan, plants
that live close to knotweeds

have had time to adapt to
this chemical cocktail

and get on well.

Knotweeds proliferate more in our cities

than in their native environment,

as they have no natural enemies.

And they have even allied
with other invaders.

The knotweed has a

special relationship with invasive ants

that are not originally from Europe.

We have found these ants
drinking the nectar

secreted by the stems,

and we believe that the ants, in turn,

keep the knotweed free of pests.

The knotweed is not the only

undesirable invasive plant.

The list of concrete conquerors is long.

Turkestan goosefoot, South African senison,

Chinese tree of heaven, etc.

Some of them become giants,

as is the case of the negundo maple

and the tree of heaven.

Trees of heaven can reach
nearly 30 meters high,

with branches of 160 meters wide.

Perhaps what is most remarkable

is their huge variety
of chemical molecules,

including herbicides,
insecticides, fungicides,

bactericides and virucides.

These are invasive and harmful plants,

but who isn't seduced by their beauty?

The knotweed has become
an ornamental plant.

To achieve their goals,

invasive plants know how to seduce us.

Perhaps all plants manipulate
us with their exquisiteness.

Citizens are so lacking in greenery,

that their sheer presence has become vital.

Plants can count on our partnership

to break into our cities.

Armies of green warrior movements

have slowly appeared in a fight

to make cities more vegetal.

They claim the right to a greener city.

Armed with seed grenades and hoes,

they want the concrete to bloom

and billboards and cars
to go green, literally.

While many plants thrive well
on walls and defy concrete,

plants have not yet won the battle

to live permanently on our asphalt.

But the idea germinates
amongst many visionaries.

We started with the Champs-Elysees.

Today we're in Lyon.

Tomorrow we continue in
Sao Paulo, New York,

Berlin and other cities.

It's about making this a poetic collage

while being impetuous,
which speaks of silence,

of nature and of the rustle of the wind,

all set in urban places,
where the noise of cars

is omnipresent.

It's along pavement, squares
and in the heart of cities,

in public spaces that no
longer belong to the public.

And that's why it touches the soul,

like some kind of a revelation.

Here is the Bellecour Square of Lyon,

the largest pedestrian square in Europe.

The idea here is to have
150 varieties of plants

that evoke biodiversity.

Their race against time

to vegetate the immense square

will last three days and two nights.

Bringing nature into the city,

as we do, is totally absurd.

But it's a dream, a childhood dream,

where you go to bed at night surrounded

by the sound of traffic,

and you wake up in the
morning in the fields.

It could be the Champs-Elysees, Bellecour,

Time Square in New York.

The stronger the emotion,
the more absurd it is,

the more it feels right.

I think what people like about this

is it's really a very collagic effect.

It's collage, and the idea of collage

is to shock through opposition.

And it's what I believe we've
done on the High Line,

where one's reception,

one's experience and reception of nature

in terms of weather, light, seasons, time,

designed nature and undesigned nature.

I think people really
like that sense of time.

That's what wild nature, in a sense,

brings to people, a sense of time,

a sense of season,

a sense of new birth and
new life in the spring,

and death in the winter.

You don't really get that if you

only think of parks and gardens
in a traditional sense.

Today's city dwellers seek out

wild urban nature settings.

They want this comeback
of natural vegetation.

They enjoy having their heads in the greens

with their feet on the tarmac.

Even if there's no more room

to create new parks and public gardens,

plants can rely on the imagination

of architects and botonists

to help them conquer the walls and rooftops

of all kinds of buildings.

20 years ago, I imagined
working in the city

with green walls and vertical gardens.

It was a way for me to
introduce living matter

into the city.

I wanted to push this idea a lot further,

to work with everything
living and re-vegetate

the city.

People are unhappy in our cities,

made of concrete and artificial materials.

To find what me miss the most,

we have to take root in
the city like plants do,

not a vegetal city that
is simply decorative,

but a vegetal city where plants play

a far more important role
than a simple aesthetic one.

Plants play an important
role in cleaning the air

so we can breathe easy in the city.

Green walls are like mini
de-polluting factories

using basic elements, air, water, plants

and earth with bacteria.

Exhaust fumes are captured by plants,

and these pollutants are decomposed

by bacteria that feed on them.

The extraordinary abilities of plants

are their best assets,

and this imposes them on our walls.

The lords of green also
inspire Luc Schuiten

for tomorrow's means of transport.

A car can also be directly inspired

by something that has grown from nature.

Here is a knot that looks
like growing tree branches

that have spread in the curves

and that form the rigidity
of the structure.

I can also draw inspiration
from a leaf that curls

and creates a dynamic that is very specific

to everything that nature produces.

If Luc Schuiten's biovegetal vehicles

are not quite ready for tomorrow,

an American engineer is
vegetalizing buses in New York.

This is Bus Roots.

The project is proposing
to install a green roof

on top of city buses to increase the amount

of green space in the cities.

Green roofs, in general
plants, they capture CO2

and provide us with oxygen.

They also capture rainwater.

They insulate the buildings
where the plants are.

They also lower the Urban
Heat Island Effect.

The plants used by Marco Castro Cosio

are essentially sedums,
well known for their

endurance to drought.

They are rarely thirsty.

They store water in their globular leaves.

It was only natural for Marco Castro Cosio

to establish his
headquarters in his biobus.

This is some of the buses,
what they may look like.

If we look closer, we can see

how they could be attached,

could have the layers of moisture

and drainage on the plants' layer.

This is another version, which would be

like a suspended system.

It's like a hammock,
which is similar to what

the biobus has right now.

This is the vines.

This is the lightest weight system.

The plants are growing on the side,

and the vines start covering
the roof in the middle.

I would love to see the
roofs of every city bus

in New York to be covered with plants.

So it would be nice to be on a bridge

and see all these buses passing by,

and you could recognize them by,

oh, there goes the lavender bus,

or there goes the basil bus.

All plants that grow absorb CO2.

This is totally harmonious
with our activities.

Plant matter was the building material

from the beginning.

It's only recently that we thought

we could go further and build with

completely artificial materials.

This is a bamboo house that grew

in just three months.

This is obviously a short period,

and it is an immense advantage over trees.

Bamboo has a total lifetime of 30 years,

which is that of a family,
of one generation.

It will be a nice way to inhabit

growing, living structures

and totally adapt it to the
lifespan of a generation.

The secrets of bamboo are hidden

beneath its microscopic structure,

in the honeycomb type cells
that ensure rigidity.

Inside each cell, spring shaped fibers

make up the backbone of the plant,

giving bamboo such remarkable strength.

Luc Schuiten is looking to the future,

but he has no doubt that plants,

through millions of years of evolution,

have many answers to our problems.

One of his dreams is of
a green, vegetal city,

where the lotus plant is used
as a key building material,

a plant of great interest
to the building industry.

The vision of Luc Schuiten to use lotus

as roof or lotus plants
as walls for housing

is extremely fascinating.

Still, you can learn a lot from that,

and that is what the Lotusan can do.

You can have the self-cleaning
effect on a well.

The results are highly convincing.

The dirty wall without a Lotusan

will have this effect on water.

The water runs down the wall,

but it takes no dirt with it.

Now, if you do the same
with the Lotusan color,

again, there's a lot of dirt,

but only before the rain.

Once the rain droplets go
on, they pick up the dirt.

What is the secret of the lotus effect?

To understand, place a leaf sample

in an electron microscope and magnify

several thousand times.

The leaf surface of the lotus

reveals thousands of peaks.

A surface on which water
droplets bounce off

without being able to spread.

The lotus, in a self-cleaning process,

seeks to protect itself against
microbial colonization.

For Luc Schuiten, reality
has already caught up

with Utopia.

He has imagined a city where humans

are not afraid to breathe in deeply,

a sustainable city where
humans are nature's friend.

I believe there's a true incentive

to return to the living,

because it's 100% sustainable.

Life is what we are by definition.

The proximity of organisms that grow,

that are alive, is certainly something

that very closely resembles our own lives.