Leaves of most plants appear green because the chlorophyll present in it :

The correct answer is A, absorbs red and blue light while reflecting green light. The green light that chlorophyll does not use is reflected back to our eyes, so leaves look green.

White sunlight contains all the colours of the visible spectrum. Chlorophyll a and chlorophyll b, the main pigments in the chloroplasts, absorb strongly in the blue-violet region (around 430 to 450 nm) and the red region (around 640 to 680 nm). This absorbed energy drives photosynthesis. Light in the green region, around 500 to 560 nm, is absorbed poorly, so most of it is reflected or passes through the leaf, and that is the colour we see. In autumn, when chlorophyll breaks down, the yellow and orange carotenoids show through.

B is wrong because a leaf that absorbed only green light would not look green. C is wrong because it reverses the facts: red and blue are absorbed, green is reflected. D is wrong because red light is absorbed strongly, not reflected, and green is not absorbed much.

Exam tip: chlorophyll absorbs blue and red most, reflects green; the colour an object shows is the colour it reflects.