Trees have proven to decrease carbon in our atmosphere, keep cities clean, and even reduce anxiety … but how exactly do they do it? Dan takes us behind the bark to understand the anatomy of our gentle green giants and how every root, leaf and twig work together to improve our planet, and what we can do to help support them in the fight against climate change.

TED Climate is produced and edited by Sheena Ozaki, mixed by Sam Bair, and hosted by Dan Kwartler. This episode adapted two lessons originally produced in animated form by the TED-Ed team. “What if there were 1 trillion more trees?" was written by Jean-François Bastin. "What happens if you cut down all of a city's trees?” was written by Stefan Al. Both pieces were produced with editorial support from Alex Rosenthal. Special thanks to Gerta Xhelo, Stephanie Lo, Michelle Quint, Banban Cheng, and Anna Phelan.