PLANTS, PEOPLE, PLANET

CONTEXT: While the agroeconomic literature on the determinants of cocoa yield among West African smallholders is abundant, it remains dominated by descriptive studies or work conducted at an aggregated regional scale, leaving open the question of the role of shade-tree management practices at the scale of the individual plantation. OBJECTIVE: This study tests whether shade-tree management practices and the farmer's socio-demographic profile explain variation in cocoa yield, using a nationwide sample of 409 plantations covering, for the first time, the three major Ivorian production zones (loops) (98, 151 and 160 plantations for loops 1, 2 and 3, respectively). METHODS: A univariate screening of 27 variables, a mixed model with a random intercept by village, a production-function specification, LASSO variable selection, and a random forest were applied, all evaluated by 5-fold cross-validation. RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS: The five approaches converge on a robust result: the deliberately planted origin of shade trees (as opposed to a residual or spontaneous origin) is the strongest and most stable determinant of yield, with a mean gap of 332 versus 183 kg/ha/year. This effect withstands four successive robustness checks: it remains significant after simultaneous adjustment for age, plantation size, production zone, technical extension, and farmer education; it is not driven by a handful of extreme plantations; it holds within each of the three production zones taken separately rather than in only one of them; and, taken in isolation, it retains a positive out-of-sample predictive power (cross-validated R2=8776; 0.05). A second group of robust determinants of more modest magnitude emerges for agricultural technical extension (ANADER/CNRA/SATMACI) and farmer education level; shade-tree alignment shows a signal in the same direction, consistent with recent independent work in Cote d'Ivoire, but becomes statistically marginal once adjusted for these other factors. The full multivariate model reaches a cross-validated R2 of around 0.07-0.08. SIGNIFICANCE: This signal, undetectable in an analysis restricted to loop 1 alone (n=98) for lack of statistical power, confirms the value of nationwide sampling for detecting modest but real agronomic determinants, and argues for integrating shade-tree origin into agroforestry extension programmes.

Distinct from plants which directly parasitise other plants (parasites), non-photosynthetic mycoheterophic plants (MHPs, previously known as achlorophyllous mycotrophs or saprophytes) depend upon fungal hyphae for their carbon and have been viewed as cheaters or parasites in their fungal partnerships rather than mutualistic as in most other plant-mycorrhizal interactions. Over 400 such species in 87 genera and 11 families are recorded which maintain this lifeform through their life-cycle, while an estimate 30,000 further species, mainly orchids, depend on this mode of life to establish themselves from seeds. In most cases the fungal partners and the ultimate carbon sources, usually autotrophic plants, are unknown. High fungal specificity is the norm in those MHPs researched. We describe a new MHP genus and species, Denisea fonensis that we discovered in the Simandou range of the Republic of Guinea, West Africa in October 2025 on the footprint of a mining project. While clearly placed in Dioscoreales (which has three MHP families), the features of Denisea are so unusual that it was not initially clear in which family to place it. Finally, with molecular data we placed Denisea in Thismiaceae, corroborated by morphology. The new discovery is all the more unexpected as this is the first record of Thismiaceae from West Africa. Until now the family has only been recorded in Africa from three species of the very different genus Oxygyne, of Cameroon and Central African Republic. We provisionally assess Denisea fonensis as Critically Endangered since less than ten individuals are recorded in only a few square metres at one site, where there are imminent threats from animals. We propose urgent measures to conserve this species to reduce the risk of global extinction that has eliminated other African MHP species such as Oxygyne triandra, and further research to determine the fungal and autotrophic plant partners of this remarkable plant genus.

Palm oil is the worlds leading vegetable oil, with production continuing to expand, particularly across Southeast Asia. Within established plantations, conserving and restoring riparian margins can reduce erosion, improve connectivity, and support biodiversity. Simultaneously, climate change is increasing thermal stress within tropical agricultural landscapes, raising the potential importance of riparian buffers as microclimatic refugia, although this has not previously been evaluated. The Riparian Ecosystem Restoration in Tropical Agriculture (RERTA) Project is a long-term Before-After Control-Impact experiment established within oil palm plantations in Riau, Indonesia, to evaluate alternative riparian restoration strategies following plantation replanting. Treatments included passive restoration (retaining mature oil palms and allowing natural regeneration), active restoration (enrichment planting with six native tree species), and a control (replanting immature oil palms to the river edge). Six years after restoration, we assessed vegetation structure using terrestrial laser scanning and thermal stability using temperature loggers and thermal imaging. We also evaluated the long-term temperature buffering capacity of each treatment under current and projected climates using CHELSA climate data and downscaled outputs from multiple General Circulation Models under Shared Socioeconomic Pathway scenarios for 2045 and 2085. Active restoration produced greater structural complexity, a more closed canopy, and cooler, more thermally stable conditions than passive restoration and control treatments. Restored margins also contained significantly more cool surface microhabitats, reducing thermal extremes under both current and future climate scenarios. Our findings demonstrate that active restoration of riparian margins can enhance thermal buffering and create microclimatic refugia for biodiversity within tropical oil palm landscapes. As agricultural intensification and climate change continue to reshape tropical ecosystems, restoring structurally complex riparian vegetation will be critical for sustaining biodiversity and the ecosystem services upon which agricultural production depends.

Soil degradation is a widespread challenge that requires a broad response at the individual farm level. To ensure effectivity, the practices should be tailored to the farm context: land manager objectives and farm specific challenges. These have however been difficult to quantify. Here we demonstrate that a workable farm context can be created based on a value survey, open satellite and soil data, and published models for vegetation gross primary productivity and soil erosion. Based on the findings, despite individual differences, farmers value profitability and operational efficiency, but also biodiversity and soil health. At least the regenerative farmers surveyed also value working for the greater good more than maintaining tradition or power. In spite of wide differences in farm production orientation, we also found that each farm also had a broad variation in individual fields GPP. Most fields have a stable GPP level, which is either high or low, and that there is a 2-3-fold difference between the weakest and best producing fields indicating the potential for improving GPP by improving the growing conditions on currently weak fields. In addition, soil loss was found to be highly concentrated in critical source areas, where 10% of the field area contributed to 50% of the soil loss. Overall, open data can be linked to modelling workflows to rapidly produce a decision-making context for farmers. This facilitates benchmarking and co-learning as well as enables land managers and advisors to identify the farm context for planning effective responses to soil degradation.

Herbarium collections represent an important but frequently underutilized source of information for documenting medicinal plant diversity and preserving ethnomedicinal knowledge. We assessed the medicinal plant diversity represented in herbarium records from the Gombe State University Herbarium (GSUH), Nigeria, and evaluated patterns in taxonomic composition, therapeutic applications, and plant parts reported for medicinal use. We also tested the hypothesis that the plant parts used medicinally are not randomly distributed across therapeutic or ailment categories, but that particular plant parts are disproportionately associated with specific therapeutic applications. The resulting dataset comprised 1,576 specimen records, including 768 recorded as medicinal plant species across 94 families and 1,426 medicinal-use records (Table S1). Fabaceae was the most species-rich family (15.8%), followed by Asteraceae (9.3%), Malvaceae (4.8%), Lamiaceae (4.4%), Rubiaceae (3.2%), and Apocynaceae (3.2%). The most frequently represented therapeutic themes were infections and sexually transmitted diseases (50.7%), gastrointestinal disorders (41.9%), pain, inflammation, and rheumatism (41.9%), fever and malaria (40.2%), and skin diseases and wounds (40.0%). Individual species had a mean of 2.98 therapeutic themes, with medicinal breadth ranging from 1 to 7 themes. A species-aware permutation test confirmed that the observed plant-part and therapeutic-theme association was significantly stronger than expected under random association (9,999 permutations, P < 0.0001). These findings demonstrate the value of herbarium collections as taxonomically anchored resources for recovering information on medicinal plant diversity. Integrating herbarium records with published ethnomedicinal knowledge provides a reproducible framework for linking plant diversity, taxonomy and traditional medicinal applications and highlights the potential of underutilised African herbaria for ethnopharmacological research.

Myricaria Desv. (Tamaricaceae) is a genus of shrubs that play a keystone role in montane riparian ecosystems across Eurasia, shaping riverine habitats and supporting ecological function. The genus has a centre of origin in the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau and exhibits a broad distribution, but many species boundaries are unresolved. Here, we present the first phylogenomic analysis of Myricaria using the Angiosperms353 target enrichment bait set, with sampling across its full geographic range. Off-target plastid loci were extracted from next-generation sequencing data using the CAPTUS bioinformatics pipeline. We infer species relationships using ASTRAL-IV and network analysis with SplitsTree, in conjunction with morphology. We also provide a taxonomic treatment of the genus, integrating our morphological observations and phylogenomic analyses for species delimitations. Based on our analyses, recognise two infrageneric sections: sect. Parallelantherae (containing only M. elegans) and sect. Myricaria (the remainder of the genus, with type species M. germanica). We also propose synonymising M. davurica, M. bracteata and M. squamosa with M. germanica. Although species boundaries in the Asian highlands remain unresolved, we conclude that the species M. elegans, M. germanica, M. laxiflora, M. longifolia, M. platyphylla, and M. pulcherrima are well-supported both phylogenomically and morphologically.

Seed ecophysiology is essential for understanding plant regeneration and developing effective conservation and ecological restoration strategies, yet knowledge remains scarce for most threatened Cerrado species. We characterised the germination niche, desiccation tolerance and storage behaviour of Xyris paradisiaca (Xyridaceae), an Endangered species endemic to Central Brazil, to assess whether its restricted distribution is associated with narrow germination requirements and to inform seed-based conservation. Germination was tested across light regimes, constant temperatures, decreasing water potentials and short-duration heat shocks, while thermal- and hydro-time models were used to quantify thermal and hydric thresholds. Seeds exhibited an absolute light requirement but broad abiotic tolerances. Germination remained >87% between 15 and 40 {degrees}C, with estimated cardinal temperatures of Tb = 8.94 {degrees}C, To = 33.13 {degrees}C and Tc = 45.53 {degrees}C. Germination remained similar to the control down to -0.6 MPa and exceeded 40% at -1.0 MPa, with a median base water potential of {Psi}b = -1.03 MPa. Germination also remained high after 1-min heat shocks up to 200 {degrees}C. Seeds were desiccation tolerant, with 100% germination after drying and a viability loss index of -0.04, and germination remained >90% after 24 months of ambient storage. Thus, the highly restricted distribution of X. paradisiaca is not driven by a narrow physiological germination niche. Its broad environmental tolerances, desiccation tolerance and favourable storage behaviour also highlight its unexplored potential for seed-based restoration, propagation and ex situ conservation.

To reduce reliance on pesticides in potato production, alternative partial control methods are needed, yet their efficacy and reliability are seldom quantified over multiple years. Canopy architecture is a potential lever against late blight, caused by Phytophthora infestans, a pathogen whose infection and development are highly driven by humidity and temperature. However, its practical value under field conditions in pure crop stands remains poorly documented. We compared two commercial potato cultivars with contrasting canopy architectures but similar leaf tissue susceptibility to P. infestans, in replicated field trials conducted over six years (2011 2016) under irrigation, and over three of these years also without irrigation. Disease and canopy development (height, closure, leaf area, stem number) were monitored throughout the growing seasons and analysed using non linear growth models. Monalisa, an erect and ramose cultivar, consistently slowed epidemic progress relative to Bintje, a semi-erect and leafy cultivar. This effect was significant in every non irrigated trial but in only half of the irrigated ones. No single canopy trait explained this suppression across all years and conditions. However, canopy closure at the time of inoculation was the most consistent correlate, supporting the hypothesis of a microclimate mediated effect. Disease reduction seldom translated into a yield benefit, except under irrigation, where Monalisa occasionally out yielded Bintje. Our results confirm that canopy architecture can complement other levers within integrated late blight management. Nevertheless, its significant year to year variability and dependence on environmental conditions must be accounted for if it is to be deployed as a reliable control method.

Global change has a major impact on rivers and their associated terrestrial compartment, the riparian forest. The black poplar (Populus nigra L.), the dominant species of the European riparian forest, is considered an indicator of the biodiversity dynamics of these ecosystems, but is threatened with extinction in several parts of its range. The species is dioecious and shows wide variability in many traits, enabling it to adapt to a broad range of environmental conditions. A detailed characterization of this natural variability is therefore a key issue both for the conservation of natural populations and for biological engineering aimed at restoring riverbanks. Phenology is both an indicator of climate change and an adaptation lever for populations, particularly in perennial species such as trees. In this study, we characterized the spatial and temporal variability in flowering phenology by studying 13 natural black poplar populations along the Loire River, France. Flowering date and duration showed substantial variability both within and between populations, and males generally flowered earlier than females. Despite this variability, the ranking of individual trees' flowering dates was highly consistent across years. Most male-female pairs shared several days of overlapping flowering each year, and this overlap was moderately stable across years. Flowering dates advanced by about five to six days per degree Celsius during early spring, with no detectable difference in sensitivity between sexes. This work contributes to the characterization of flowering variability in an economically important tree species and may inform both the conservation of genetic resources and breeding.

Climate change is reshaping weed population dynamics, creating non-stationary management challenges for which static decision rules are insufficient. This chapter presents and evaluates an open surveillance toolkit of artificial intelligence tools for recognizing and mapping Ambrosia artemisiifolia (common ragweed) at complementary spatial scales, tested across two phenological phases (seedling, September 2024; adult, December 2024) in a lentil paddock in central Chile. At the field scale, a YOLOv11 detection model coupled with Slicing Aided Hyper Inference achieved mAP50 of 0.886. Cross-domain experiments revealed that single-site models collapse catastrophically when deployed in new geographies (mAP50 dropping to 0.108), but multi-domain training recovers performance to 0.874. At the satellite scale, PRESTO foundation model embeddings correlated strongly with ground-truth weed density (r = 0.739); geographically weighted regression explained up to 91% of local density variance. All methods are released as the ragweed-ai-toolkit (https://github.com/agroia-lab/ragweed-ai-toolkit), a modular open-source Python package enabling adaptation to new species and geographies.

The potential of alternative agricultural systems, such as organic or conservation agriculture, for biodiversity restoration has been widely investigated. However, variability of practices within each of these two categories of agricultural system has rarely been accounted for. Furthermore, these systems have most often been studied separately, isolating either organic or conservation agriculture (itself often reduced to a soil tillage reduction), and rarely analyzing these systems side by side. This study attempts to disentangle these multiple interrelationships by sampling carabid beetles in a network of 48 commercial Belgian farms including organic agriculture (OA), conservation agriculture (CA), farms combining the two approaches (OCA) and farms applying conventional practices (CVA). In each farm, we sampled carabids using pitfall and emergence traps in one winter cereal field and collected a detailed description of crop management practices. We found that community composition was primarily structured by seasonality early in the season (March, April) followed by convergence (May, June) driven by the aggregation of the most dominant species. Based on agroecosystem classification, organic certification (i.e., the absence of synthetic pesticide use) exerted a twofold stronger effect than application of conservation agriculture principles (i.e., reduced or no soil tillage) on carabid beetle community composition. Notably, OCA supported carabid assemblages that were structurally distinct from those of CA and CVA. Furthermore, carabid communities associated with OA differed significantly in composition from those of CVA. Observed and estimated species richness were also significantly higher in OCA than in CA and CVA, while OA differed from CVA only for observed richness. Beyond differences among agricultural systems, community responses were associated with specific management practices, which explained nearly a quarter of the compositional variation with significant influence of the duration since organic conversion and the frequency of synthetic pesticide application. Carabid abundances were negatively affected by synthetic pesticides and moldboard ploughing, whereas richness was more strongly related to the time since conversion to OA, cover crops, and organic amendments. Overall, these results position synthetic inputs and time since conversion as the main filters over carabid communities. Our study highlights the importance of jointly considering system level analyses and detailed management practices to better understand the complex relationships between agricultural practices and carabid communities.

Megadiverse countries concentrate most of the World's biodiversity. These countries encompass different levels of research infrastructure, and nearly all of them have been historically committed to the Convention of Biological Diversity, often setting precedents and leading new approaches. Here, we ask whether the assessment of genetic diversity indicators provide novel insights for biodiversity management and conservation in one of those countries, Mexico. We evaluated the first national application of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), genetic diversity indicators in Mexico. The data covered 97 taxa across diverse ecosystem types and taxonomic groups, including crop wild relatives, to assess the capacity of genetic diversity indicators to provide novel insights, as well as their relevance for strengthening national conservation strategies. We calculated two indicators: the proportion of populations with an effective population size greater than 500 (Ne 500) and the proportion of populations maintained (PM). Data were sufficient to estimate the Ne 500 indicator for 47 taxa and the PM for 28 taxa, with mean indicator values of 0.217 and 0.936, respectively. Species' geographic range was positively associated with Ne 500, whereas national endemicity had no significant effect. Comparisons with the IUCN Red List and Mexico's national extinction-risk legislation revealed that genetic vulnerability occurs even among taxa not currently recognized as threatened. Our findings highlight a gap in legal recognition of genetic diversity protection that could be strengthened by incorporating population-level assessments focused on maintaining adaptive potential in the long-term. Additionally, the indicators allowed to highlight conservation concerns within crop wild relatives, though fully realizing their potential requires integrating the entire wild-to-domesticated complex. The Mexican experience highlights that the main challenge for scaling the monitoring of genetic diversity is not only generating new data, but integrating existing information into systems that strengthen collaboration and communication among researchers, local communities, and government institutions.

The mechanisation of agriculture has achieved major increases in labour productivity but has also led to an erosion of agrobiodiversity. Neglected and underutilized crops such as common buckwheat (Fagopyrum esculentum Moench) offer the potential to diversify food production systems but require major genetic improvement to compete with established crops. Although target traits for breeding such as more homogeneous ripening, reduced height, larger seeds and higher and more stable yields are well known, large-scale and field-based phenotyping data of diverse common buckwheat accessions across multiple environments are still scarce. Here, we tested the agronomic performance of a common buckwheat germplasm collection consisting of 170 accessions of diverse origin. The collection was tested at seven year-sites, and 19 agronomic traits related to phenology, growth habit and yield were assessed. Most traits showed high repeatability (0.31 < R2 < 0.98) and heritability (0.45 < H2 < 0.97), indicating genetic control of these traits. Coefficients of variation ranged between 6.19% and 46.15%, showing the high phenotypic diversity within the collection. By combining multiple traits, distinct ideotypes for different roles in the crop rotation were investigated, and accessions with promising agronomic profiles identified. Genome-wide association studies revealed marker-trait associations for 18 traits, allowing the identification of putative candidate genes influencing these traits such as a putative GRF-INTERACTING FACTOR associated with flowering time and biomass production. Our results show that the collection offers vast phenotypic diversity that can be exploited for the development of improved varieties tailored to meet specific agronomic purposes. The efficient utilization of these genetic resources should be supported by the application of genomics-based breeding approaches. The development of genetic markers and search for putative candidate genes mark important steps towards the establishment of efficient breeding schemes. Thus, these genomic resources provide a foundation for accelerating the genetic improvement of common buckwheat and developing agronomically competitive varieties.

Background: Alternaria leaf spot (ALS), caused by fungi in the genus Alternaria (family Pleosporaceae), is a significant fungal disease that affects cotton production in the Lake Zone of Tanzania, the country's main cotton-producing region. The disease reduces photosynthetic capacity, boll retention, and fiber quality, leading to substantial yield losses in affected fields. Despite its increasing prevalence, systematic baseline epidemiological data remain scarce. Objective: This study aimed to determine the occurrence, incidence, and severity of Alternaria leaf spot across the major cotton-growing districts of the Lake Zone, Tanzania. Methods: Field surveys were conducted during the 2024-2025 growing season in the districts of Bariadi, Bunda, Chato, and Magu; 20 representative cotton fields were systematically assessed using a diagonal sampling approach. Disease incidence, prevalence, and severity were recorded for 1,000 cotton plants. Fungal isolates recovered from symptomatic leaves were sent to the laboratory for isolation and morphological identification. Results: Field prevalence was 100%, and the overall mean incidence was 64.4%, with significant inter-district variation: Bariadi (77.6%), Bunda (68.8%), Chato (60.0%), and Magu (52.4%). Mean DSI ranged from 44.0% (Magu) to 70.1% (Bariadi), indicating moderate-to-severe infection. Disease incidence and Disease severity (DSI) were strongly correlated when uninfected plants were included (r = 0.942, P < 0.001). However, this relationship weakened substantially and became non-significant when restricted to infected plants only (r = 0.396, P = 0.084). This suggests that higher incidence reflected more plants becoming infected rather than greater severity among already infected plants. Morphological characterization identified all 40 isolates as belonging to the genus Alternaria. Conclusion: These findings provide the first systematic epidemiological baseline for Alternaria leaf spot across the major cotton-growing districts of Tanzania's Lake Zone. Disease incidence and severity varied significantly across districts, underscoring the need for tailored disease management strategies. This study recommends ongoing surveillance and integrated disease management to safeguard cotton productivity among smallholder farmers in the region.

Aims In forest ecosystems, tree species composition and diversity are fundamental drivers of biodiversity and many species are closely associated to specific tree species as hosts. Saproxylic diversity across tree species may be shaped by interactions between ecological and environmental factors, such as resource availability. However, a throughout and unbiased quantification of diversity across tree species is missing. We investigated patterns an drivers of saproxylic beetle diversity across European tree genera while accounting for differences in sampling effort. Location Europe Methods We used a large dataset, of 25 studies, comprising 500,000 deadwood-dependent beetles, representing 1041 saproxylic beetle species, sampled from 29 tree genera. We accounted for sampling effort by estimating diversity using coverage-based standardization across Hill numbers. We than used linear models to identify drivers of saproxylic beetle diversity across tree genera and assessed differences in community composition using Nonmetric Multidimensional Scaling (NMDS). Additionally, the most abundant beetle families were identified for a subset of 14 genera. Results Quercus supported the highest richness of infrequent, frequent, and highly frequent species, while Fagus exhibited the highest observed (unstandardized) species richness. Beetle communities were less differentiated when focusing on infrequent species, whereas tree genera were separated when focusing on frequent and highly frequent species. In addition, we found that resource availability and maximum tree height best predicted infrequent beetle diversity, whereas resource availability was the main driver of frequent species. In contrast, the same analyses for unstandardized data indicated postglacial occurrence as an important factor for infrequent species. Main conclusions Although resource availability supported the species area hypothesis, standardized data revealed higher richness on smaller trees, partly contradicting this pattern. Our results highlight the importance of accounting for sampling bias and promoting tree diversity, particularly oaks, to sustain saproxylic beetle diversity.

Populations are denser in the urban areas where there is inadequate arable land for farming. This calls for innovative use of limited spaces in sac farming to produce food to augment household nutrition. The study determined the feasibility of cultivating and comparing the performance of different frafra potato varieties in polypropylene sacs. A Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with six treatments, each having three replications, was used. Each treatment was a variety of frafra potato, cultivated on a polypropylene sac filled with nutrient-enriched soil. The data collected was analyzed using STATA 15.0. The results show that plants having leaves with the largest leaf area in 2021 (20.54 (8.41) cm2) and in 2022 (19.98 (7.83) cm2) were in the MAL variety. The greatest number of leaves (417.11 (255.26)) were produced by the WAP variety in 2021 but by the MAM variety (349.33 (154.63)) in 2022. Plants having the longest vines in 2021 were in the MAM strain (41.24 (22.01) cm) but in the NAT variety (39.93 (21.54) cm) in 2022. In 2021, the highest yield of tubers was 5.56 (0.23) t/ha in the MAL variety with the lowest yield (1.59 (1.27)) t/ha recorded in the LOV strain. In 2022, the NUP variety produced the highest yield (1.91 (0.40)) (t/ha) with the WAP strain producing the lowest (0.87 (0.50)) (t/ha). The data shows that it is feasible to cultivate frafra potatoes on polypropylene sacs. In the main, all the frafra potato varieties produced considerable quantities of vegetative organ biomass and root tubers with the MAL, NAT and NUP varieties performing better. Therefore, though further investigation is required to draw an appropriate conclusion, these varieties may be recommended for cultivation on polypropylene sacs to produce food for both humans and livestock consumption.

Carbon farming practices are increasingly adopted as part of regenerative agriculture to enhance soil carbon sequestration and improve agricultural sustainability. However, their effects on the phyllosphere microbiome, and how these interact with field biodiversity, remain poorly understood. We investigated how field biodiversity and carbon farming practices (cover crops, all-in mixes, adaptive grazing and ley mixture) influence leaf microbial communities across 19 Finnish farms using ITS and 16S amplicon sequencing. Foliar fungal - but not bacterial - diversity increased with plant species richness. Carbon farming altered both fungal and bacterial community composition, but only fungal community was positively associated with disease load. Network analysis identified three candidate keystone taxa: Alternaria sp. (FASV 34) and Sporobolomyces roseus (FASV 2070), which were mutually exclusive, and Methylobacterium sp. (BASV 75), which co-occurred with FASV 2070. Together, these findings demonstrate that different carbon farming practices shape distinct leaf microbiomes cover crop systems tending to favor potential fungal pathogens, whereas ley mixture and adaptive grazing strategies promote microbial taxa associated with healthier phyllosphere communities. Our study underscores the importance of understanding the complex microbial interactions within leaf ecosystems to inform sustainable agricultural practices.

Extensive green roofs are an important component of urban green infrastructure. However, harsh rooftop conditions, including shallow substrates, high temperatures and limited water availability, considerably restrict plant selection. Although extensive green roofs are traditionally dominated by succulent species, increasing attention has been directed towards annual plants because of their rapid establishment, developmental plasticity and potential contribution to vegetation diversity. This review aimed to identify annual plant species introduced on extensive green roofs and to characterize the functional traits most frequently associated with their establishment under rooftop conditions. In addition, the review examined the geographical distribution and methodological characteristics of existing studies and identified species with potential for application under temperate climatic conditions. A total of 22 studies published between 2015 and 2025 were analyzed, comprising 100 annual species representing 29 plant families. The reviewed studies showed a clear geographical bias towards Mediterranean and arid regions, whereas temperate climates were considerably underrepresented. Among species occurring in Central Europe, ruderal life strategies, drought avoidance, efficient dispersal mechanisms, low plant height and prolonged flowering were the most frequently observed functional characteristics, while seed mass and specific leaf area (SLA) exhibited substantial interspecific variation. These findings suggest that functional traits, rather than taxonomic affiliation alone, provide a useful framework for selecting annual species for extensive green roofs. The review also highlights the need for long-term studies conducted under temperate climatic conditions to improve evidence-based plant selection and support the development of resilient and multifunctional green roof vegetation.

Pterocarpus erinaceus Poir. (Fabaceae), the barwood or vene, is at the heart of one of the most severe conservation crises currently affecting tropical timber species. It has become the most heavily traded timber species in the world by volume, at the centre of an illegal rosewood trade to Asia that has driven the species to near-total disappearance in several countries despite its listing on CITES Appendix II since 2016. Faced with this urgency, ex situ conservation and restoration programmes often rest on the untested assumption that selecting seed trees by size improves the quality of the offspring produced in the nursery. This study rigorously tests this hypothesis against the competing one of a determinism dominated by the planting site, using six complementary analytical approaches (continuous regression, linear mixed models with a site x seed-tree interaction, seed-mass mediation analysis, non-linear growth modelling of height and diameter, between-site phenotypic plasticity, and multi-predictor allometric equations), across two contrasting bioclimatic sites in COte d'Ivoire (Korhogo: dry zone; Daloa: humid zone) and six seed-tree categories. Site exerts a decisive influence on growth at all ages (ANOVA, p<0.001 for height, diameter and biomass), whereas germination does not differ significantly between sites (70.3% at Daloa versus 61.6% at Korhogo; X2=1.95; p=0.162). Seed-tree DBH does not affect growth in any of the tests (continuous regression, p>0.30; mixed model, p>0.07), and the seed-mass mediation analysis remains inconclusive, seed mass varying only slightly among seed trees in this species (0.07-0.08 g). The exponential growth model provides the best fit for height and diameter at both sites, and two-predictor allometric equations explain 96.2% of biomass variance compared with 89.9% for the single-predictor model. These results indicate that ex situ conservation and compensatory reforestation programmes for this endangered species would benefit from prioritising the choice of planting site over the dendrometric selection of seed trees. A recommendation directly applicable to conservation nurseries established in response to the rosewood crisis.

Rubber vines (Cryptostegia madagascariensis and C. grandiflora) are highly invasive weeds in the semi-arid landscapes of many tropical regions. The rust fungus Maravalia cryptostegiae has provided a spetatular and sustainable control of invasive C. grandiflora populations in Australia, after its scientific and quarantine-authorized release in the context of a classical biological control program. The Caatinga biome of Northeastern Brazil is under a devastating invasion by C. madagascariensis. This species is also susceptible to M. cryptostegia but its epidemic potential towards C. madagascariensis in Brazil remains unknown. We developed a weather-driven epidemiological model integrating experimentally derived relationships for infection as a function of temperature and wetness duration and for temperature-dependent latent development. Three infection-response models were fitted to 20 experimental temperature x wetness combinations from the literature and compared using information criteria, grouped cross-validation and a parametric bootstrap. The selected model, in which thermal breadth increases with wetness duration, was best supported (R2 = 0.931; {Delta}AICc [&ge;] 3.3 relative to the alternatives), and prolonged wetness significantly broadened the thermal range favorable for infection ({gamma} = 0.30 oC h-1; bootstrap P = 0.002). The infection and latent-development models were coupled with 25 years (2001-2025) of hourly NASA POWER data for 65 grid cells representing rubber-vine-infested locations in Northeastern Brazil, with wetness defined as hours with relative humidity equal or greater than 90%. Infection potential was concentrated in March-June (73% of the annual total, peaking in April), coinciding with the regional rainy season, and was highest in the interior of northern and central Ceara. Predicted potential varied more than a hundredfold among grid cells and was lowest along parts of the Ceara coast and the lower Jaguaribe valley, which include some of the largest infestations; the magnitude of these contrasts depended on the humidity threshold used to define wetness. Applied with identical rules to 13 historical release sites in Queensland, Australia, the model reproduced the documented wet-season timing of rust activity, and predicted potential was on average higher at sites with reported high rust impact, although the difference was not statistically significant. These results indicate strong seasonal and geographic structuring of weather-driven epidemic potential and provide testable hypotheses for selecting release periods and locations for M. cryptostegiae in Brazil.