Indigenous agroforests (food-producing agroecosystems where trees and crops grow together in forest-like environments) may offer valuable insights for addressing two of the world’s biggest challenges: declining biodiversity and rising non-communicable disease, according to research led by University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa researchers. Published in July 2025 in Global Food Security, the study found that agroforests with greater ecological diversity also offer a more nutritionally diverse food supply. 

New Arizona State University-led research findings from studying over two decades of satellite observations reveal that the Earth’s continents have experienced unprecedented freshwater loss since 2002, driven by climate change, unsustainable groundwater use and extreme droughts. The study highlights the emergence of four continental-scale “mega-drying” regions, all located in the northern hemisphere, and warns of severe consequences for water security, agriculture, sea level rise, and global stability. The research team reports that drying areas on land are expanding at a rate roughly twice the size of California every year. And, the rate at which dry areas are getting drier now outpaces the rate at which wet areas are getting wetter, reversing long-standing hydrological patterns. The negative implications of this for available freshwater are staggering. 75% of the world’s population lives in 101 countries that have been losing freshwater for the past 22 years.

Researchers at Cranfield University are working on a new project to speed up genetic engineering in plants, accelerating innovations that will improve crops around the world.

A research team developed a novel method using bidirectional reflectance factor (BRF) spectra combined with the PROSPECT-PRO model and modified ratio indices to estimate nitrogen content nondestructively.

In semiarid farmlands, microbes are quietly shaping the planet's carbon cycle.