Theres also not much evolutionary pressure for plants to develop the ability to do this themselves since nitrogen availability usually isn’t as much of a problem for wild plants that aren’t getting constantly harvested and replanted rather than dying and decomposing naturally allowing their nutrients to return to the soil (also evolving an entirely new metabolic pathway with new enzymes and everything would take at least several million years)
ThrowRA_N7 t1_iuinpuq wrote
Reply to comment by Drewismole in ELI5 Why can’t plants absorb nitrogen from the air? by Cool-Boy57
Theres also not much evolutionary pressure for plants to develop the ability to do this themselves since nitrogen availability usually isn’t as much of a problem for wild plants that aren’t getting constantly harvested and replanted rather than dying and decomposing naturally allowing their nutrients to return to the soil (also evolving an entirely new metabolic pathway with new enzymes and everything would take at least several million years)