14 DAY TRIAL // It's that time of the year again. Trees are dropping their leaves and, soon enough, they'll be completely bare. Nothing to worry about, it's just how nature works when autumn comes around.
The simplest explanation for why leaves change color in fall is that this happens because they lose their chlorophyll molecules, which happen to be green and are present in leaves to help with photosynthesis.
With the chlorophyll gone, the yellow and orange pigments that are too present in leaves but that remain hidden all throughout spring and summer finally get their chance to shine through.
As for why leaves are left without their chlorophyll before falling to the ground, researchers say trees purposely destroy these molecules when summer is over so that they may recover all the valuable nutrients stored in them before it is too late and they lose them for good.
Unless the chlorophyll is destroyed in this process of recovering precious nutrients from leaves, it would interact with oxygen and impede the recovery. So, rather than let it run rampant, trees simply break it down to make sure it won't interfere with their new agenda.
Scientists say many trees have evolved to lose their leaves in autumn and then grow them back come spring because holding on to them all throughout winter and keeping them alive would require too much energy, which nature does not very easily spend.
