Economic and Medicinal

Importance of
Bryophytes
NEIBEINUO SOLO
222BOT22
1 M.SC BOTANY
Bryophytes
Introduction
• Bryophytes are small, non-vascular plants that grow in shady, damp regions.
• They are classified into three classes – Class Hepaticopsida (Liverworts), Class
Anthocerotopsida (Hornworts) and Class Bryopsida (Mosses).
• They show alteration of generation between the gametophyte which produces
the sex organs and the sporophyte, which produces the spores.
• They don’t produce flowers and seeds, and instead reproduce through spores.
Economic Importance
• Sphagnum plants decompose and carbonise under pressure forming peat. Peat
is a dark brown coloured spongy substance that has many other uses :
• Rich in carbon.
• Improves soil texture.
• Used in surgical dressings.
• Used for packing material.
• Preparation of ethyl alcohol.
• Bryophytes are used as food source for animals useful to humans.

• Mosses prevent soil erosion.

• Mosses help in bog succession.

• Bryophytes act as pollution indicators.

Medicinal Importance
• Liverworts like Marchantia polymorpha is used to cure pulmonary tuberculosis
and afflictions of liver.
• A decoction of dried Sphagnum is used to treat diseases of eye and acute haemorrhage.
• A by-product of peat referred to as peat tar is found to have antiseptic properties and is also
used as a preservative.
• A distillate of peat tar, Sphagnol, is useful in treating skin diseases.
• An extract of Rhodobryum giganteum can increase aorta blood transit by upto 30% in animals.
• Kidney stones and stones of gall bladder are dissolved by tea made of Polytrichum commune.
• Burned ash of mosses mixed with fat and honey is used as an ointment for cuts, burns and
wounds in the Himalayan region.
• The liverwort Marchantia polymorpha is also used as a medicine for boils and abcesses.
• Transgenic Physcomitrella are being used to produce ‘blood clotting IX’ for the treatment of
haemophilia B.
• Anti-leukemic activity has been observed in Plagiochila fasculata, a leafy bryophyte, which
seemed to inhibit P388 cells.
• Anti-microbial effects have been found in several bryophyte species.
Eg: Polygonial from Porella, Norpiguisone from Conocephalum conicum and Lunularia from
Lunularia cruciana.
References
• Vashishta, B. (2001, January 31). Botany for Degree Students.
• Crum, H.A., & Vashishta, B.R. (1964). Botany (For Degree Students). Part III.
Bryophyta. The Bryologist, 67, 382.
• Ogwu, Matthew. (2019). Ecological and Economic Significance of Bryophytes.
10.4018/978-1-7998-1226-5.ch004.
• Chandra, S., Chandra, D., Barh, A., Pankaj, Pandey, R. K., & Sharma, I. P. (2016).
Bryophytes: Hoard of remedies, an ethno-medicinal review. Journal of traditional and
complementary medicine, 7(1), 94–98. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jtcme.2016.01.007
• Saxena, D.K., & Harinder (2004). Uses of bryophytes. Resonance, 9, 56-65.