Plants are essential for any ecosystem, being both a food source and habitat for living things. Although plants are stationary, many are dangerous to touch or eat, making you sick or cause a bad reaction. Some of the most poisonous plants are described below:

Abrus Precarious or Rosary Pea (Left)

This plant has beans that contain a deadly poison. Ironically, their seeds are often used in jewelry and rosary making, but are not harmful when touched, only if chewed or scratched. The poison is known to stop protein synthesis, leading to organ failure.

Ricinus Communis or the Castor Bean (Center)

The castor bean plant comes from Africa and its seed is the source of castor oil used all over the world. However, the seeds contain a deadly poison called ...

Meet Wolffia globosa, the smallest flowering plant in the world. The plant measures less than 0.2 mm in diameter, and can be found in streams and ponds in Australia, Asia and some regions of the Americas.

By manipulating chemical gradients in a beaker of fluid, the behavior of crystal growth can be controlled, creating precisely tailored structures – “flowers” at the scale of microns – that bloom in a beaker.

Though these minuscule sculptures don't resemble the cubic or jagged forms normally associated with crystals, they “bloom” from the surface of a submerged glass slide, assembling themselves one molecule at a time.

The precipitation of the crystals depends on a reaction of compounds that are diffusing through a liquid solution. The crystals grow toward or away from certain chemical gradients as the pH of the reaction shifts back and forth. The conditions of the reaction dictate whether the structure resembles broad, radiating leaves, a thi ...

These are monkey orchids (Orchis simia). This species can be found in Europe, the Mediterranean, Russia, Asia Minor, and Iran.