NASA - National Aeronautics and Space Administration

The Aura Ozone Garden. Credit: NASA

The Aura Ozone-Monitoring Garden is breaking new grounds at Goddard's Visitor Center. The nature of these plants helps make visible what is normally invisible. They demonstrate on Earth what satellite observations are telling us.

The ozone-monitoring garden is full of plants that scientists have found to be ozone-sensitive. When exposed to high levels of ozone, each of these plants shows damage on their leaves. Older leaves have the most damage. Plants with ozone damage have very fine colored spots on the upper surfaces of their leaves, and some leaves also turn yellow. Ozone sensitive plants growing in the garden include cutleaf coneflower, cardinal flower, flowering dogwood, and black-eyed susan. All of these species are fairly common and easy to grow, so can serve well for educational gardens.

Students, teachers and other visitors to the Goddard Visitor Center can learn and teach about atmospheric chemistry and public health with the garden, and can learn about setting up their own ozone-monitoring programs.

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