Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-06-06DOI: 10.1038/s43016-025-01179-y
Margarita Garcia-Vila, Murilo dos Santos Vianna, Matthew Tom Harrison, Ke Liu, Rogério de S. Nóia-Júnior, Tobias K. D. Weber, Jin Zhao, Marco Acutis, Sotirios Archontoulis, Senthold Asseng, Pierre Aubry, Juraj Balkovic, Bruno Basso, Xianguan Chen, Yi Chen, Quirijn de Jong van Lier, Mathieu Delandmeter, Allard de Wit, Benjamin Dumont, Roberto Ferrise, Christian Folberth, Mara Gabbrielli, Thomas Gaiser, Aram Gorooei, Gerrit Hoogenboom, Kurt Christian Kersebaum, Yean-Uk Kim, David Kraus, Bing Liu, Lioba Martin, Klaas Metselaar, Claas Nendel, Gloria Padovan, Alessia Perego, Diana Maria Seserman, Clemens Scheer, Vakhtang Shelia, Valentina Stocca, Fulu Tao, Enli Wang, Heidi Webber, Zhigan Zhao, Yan Zhu, Taru Palosuo
{"title":"Gaps and strategies for accurate simulation of waterlogging impacts on crop productivity","authors":"Margarita Garcia-Vila, Murilo dos Santos Vianna, Matthew Tom Harrison, Ke Liu, Rogério de S. Nóia-Júnior, Tobias K. D. Weber, Jin Zhao, Marco Acutis, Sotirios Archontoulis, Senthold Asseng, Pierre Aubry, Juraj Balkovic, Bruno Basso, Xianguan Chen, Yi Chen, Quirijn de Jong van Lier, Mathieu Delandmeter, Allard de Wit, Benjamin Dumont, Roberto Ferrise, Christian Folberth, Mara Gabbrielli, Thomas Gaiser, Aram Gorooei, Gerrit Hoogenboom, Kurt Christian Kersebaum, Yean-Uk Kim, David Kraus, Bing Liu, Lioba Martin, Klaas Metselaar, Claas Nendel, Gloria Padovan, Alessia Perego, Diana Maria Seserman, Clemens Scheer, Vakhtang Shelia, Valentina Stocca, Fulu Tao, Enli Wang, Heidi Webber, Zhigan Zhao, Yan Zhu, Taru Palosuo","doi":"10.1038/s43016-025-01179-y","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-025-01179-y","url":null,"abstract":"<p>With the changing climate, soil waterlogging is a growing threat to food security. Yet, contemporary approaches employed in crop models to simulate waterlogging are in their infancy. By analysing 21 crop models, we show that critical deficiencies persist in accurately simulating capillary rise, crop resistance to transient periods of waterlogging, crop recovery mechanisms, and the effects on soil nitrogen processes, phenology and yield components. This hinders the ability of such models to reliably simulate the impacts of excessive soil moisture. Advanced crop modelling analytics will enable scenario analysis and, with time, farming systems adaptation to climate change and increasing frequency of crop failure due to waterlogging.</p>","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"25 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144228444","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-06-06DOI: 10.1038/s43016-025-01186-z
Joann K. Whalen, Shamim Gul
{"title":"Managing soil health for resilient crop production","authors":"Joann K. Whalen, Shamim Gul","doi":"10.1038/s43016-025-01186-z","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-025-01186-z","url":null,"abstract":"Healthy, fertile soil helps reduce nitrogen surpluses, increase carbon sequestration and is the foundation of a nutritious food supply for healthy people on a healthy planet.","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"26 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144228656","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-06-02DOI: 10.1038/s43016-025-01176-1
Benjamin H. Parmenter, Alysha S. Thompson, Nicola P. Bondonno, Amy Jennings, Kevin Murray, Aurora Perez-Cornago, Jonathan M. Hodgson, Anna Tresserra-Rimbau, Tilman Kühn, Aedín Cassidy
{"title":"High diversity of dietary flavonoid intake is associated with a lower risk of all-cause mortality and major chronic diseases","authors":"Benjamin H. Parmenter, Alysha S. Thompson, Nicola P. Bondonno, Amy Jennings, Kevin Murray, Aurora Perez-Cornago, Jonathan M. Hodgson, Anna Tresserra-Rimbau, Tilman Kühn, Aedín Cassidy","doi":"10.1038/s43016-025-01176-1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-025-01176-1","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Higher habitual intakes of dietary flavonoids have been linked with a lower risk of all-cause mortality and major chronic disease. Yet, the contribution of diversity of flavonoid intake to health outcomes remains to be investigated. Here, using a cohort of 124,805 UK Biobank participants, we show that participants who consumed the widest diversity of dietary flavonoids, flavonoid-rich foods and/or specific flavonoid subclasses had a 6–20% significantly lower risk of all-cause mortality and incidence of cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, cancer, respiratory disease and neurodegenerative disease. Furthermore, we report that both quantity and diversity of flavonoids are independent predictors of mortality and several chronic diseases, suggesting that consuming a higher quantity and wider diversity is better for longer-term health than either component alone. These findings suggest that consuming several different daily servings of flavonoid-rich foods or beverages, such as tea, berries, apples, oranges or grapes, may lower risk of all-cause mortality and chronic disease.</p>","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"36 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144193056","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-05-30DOI: 10.1038/s43016-025-01183-2
Daniel P. Bebber
{"title":"El Niño drives international pest migration","authors":"Daniel P. Bebber","doi":"10.1038/s43016-025-01183-2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-025-01183-2","url":null,"abstract":"El Niño indirectly moderates rice yields in China through effects on migratory pests, highlighting the need to incorporate transboundary ecological processes into climate risk assessments and agricultural forecasting.","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"55 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-05-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144176536","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-05-27DOI: 10.1038/s43016-025-01177-0
Anna W. Herforth, Yan Bai, Aishwarya Venkat, William A. Masters
{"title":"The Healthy Diet Basket is a valid global standard that highlights lack of access to healthy and sustainable diets","authors":"Anna W. Herforth, Yan Bai, Aishwarya Venkat, William A. Masters","doi":"10.1038/s43016-025-01177-0","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-025-01177-0","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The Healthy Diet Basket (HDB) is a standard developed from food-based dietary guidelines (FBDG) for the measurement of the Cost and Affordability of a Healthy Diet—a new indicator of food security tracked by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Bank. Here we analysed the HDB’s economic, nutritional and environmental characteristics of least-cost diets relative to 16 national FBDG and the EAT-Lancet reference diet. The HDB cost averaged US$3.68 per person per day in 2021, slightly lower than most FBDG. Macronutrient levels fell within acceptable macronutrient distribution ranges, and the average mean adequacy ratio of 15 micronutrients and protein was 95% for the HDB, equivalent to the average mean adequacy ratio across FBDG. The HDB’s carbon and water footprints were found to be similar to the EAT-Lancet reference diet. These findings demonstrate the use of the HDB as a global standard and highlight the lack of access to healthy and sustainable diets globally.</p>","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"19 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-05-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144145751","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-05-23DOI: 10.1038/s43016-025-01174-3
Jeroen Candel, Carsten Daugbjerg
{"title":"EU Green Deal’s food system agenda fails to deliver post-exceptionalist breakthrough","authors":"Jeroen Candel, Carsten Daugbjerg","doi":"10.1038/s43016-025-01174-3","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-025-01174-3","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The European Commission’s Farm to Fork and Biodiversity strategies were widely praised as important steps towards a healthier and more sustainable EU food system. Although this agenda was seen by some as a leap towards increased post-exceptionalism in EU agri-food policy-making, recent political backlash against the Green Deal’s food system ambitions has called into question whether such a post-exceptionalist breakthrough has indeed occurred. Here, we systematically analyse recent shifts in EU agri-food governance across four dimensions of (post-)exceptionalism: ideas, institutions, interests and policies. Despite a diversification of food system sustainability concerns in policy debates, along with some institutional opening and broader consultations with interest groups, we show that policy transformations were very limited—leaving space for emerging political tensions and increasing pressure for deeper post-exceptionalist reform in EU agri-food policies.</p>","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"137 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-05-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144122504","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-05-22DOI: 10.1038/s43016-025-01170-7
Stephanie Walton, Zia Mehrabi, Jessica Fanzo, Ben Caldecott
{"title":"Asset stranding could open new pathways to food systems transformation","authors":"Stephanie Walton, Zia Mehrabi, Jessica Fanzo, Ben Caldecott","doi":"10.1038/s43016-025-01170-7","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-025-01170-7","url":null,"abstract":"<p>As the necessity of transitioning to food systems that are healthy and environmentally sustainable grows increasingly urgent, food systems seem to be locked into delivering negative outcomes. One driver of this lock-in is that some of the changes from transitioning food systems would result in asset stranding for firms and financial institutions. In this Perspective we provide examples of where asset stranding can occur in food systems and offer solutions for navigating the political economy of these stranded assets. By proactively attending to the stranded assets problem, it may be possible to break out of financial lock-in in food systems.</p>","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"9 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-05-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144113593","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-05-21DOI: 10.1038/s43016-025-01181-4
Yufang Guo
{"title":"Breeding beyond trade-offs","authors":"Yufang Guo","doi":"10.1038/s43016-025-01181-4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-025-01181-4","url":null,"abstract":"<p>In a recent study, Yibo Li and colleagues from Huazhong Agricultural University, China, identified a major rice locus, <i>QT12</i>, that encodes a putative Sec61 translocon β subunit and plays a critical role in regulating thermotolerance for grain quality. They demonstrated that <i>QT12</i> negatively affects grain-quality stability under heat stress, particularly by promoting grain chalkiness, a key indicator of quality deterioration that reduces the nutritional value, cooking performance and market appeal of rice.</p><p>The study further revealed that <i>QT12</i> expression is regulated by a natural on–off gene switch involving the nuclear factor Y (NF-Y) complex, which modulates its expression in response to rising temperatures. High temperature disrupts NF-Y interactions and activates the switch system, increasing <i>QT12</i> expression and leading to grain quality deterioration and reduced thermotolerance in rice. Large-scale field trials showed that low-expression or non-functional <i>QT12</i> can simultaneously improve grain yield and quality in elite varieties without compromising other agronomic traits, offering a promising strategy for climate-resilient rice breeding.</p>","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"35 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-05-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144104002","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-05-16DOI: 10.1038/s43016-025-01173-4
Jonas Stehl, Alexander Vonderschmidt, Sebastian Vollmer, Peter Alexander, Lindsay M. Jaacks
{"title":"Gap between national food production and food-based dietary guidance highlights lack of national self-sufficiency","authors":"Jonas Stehl, Alexander Vonderschmidt, Sebastian Vollmer, Peter Alexander, Lindsay M. Jaacks","doi":"10.1038/s43016-025-01173-4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-025-01173-4","url":null,"abstract":"<p>In light of nationalist trends, disruptions to global food supply chains and efforts to concurrently promote sustainable diets, we assess national capacities to achieve dietary guidelines based on domestic production alone. Over a third of all countries cannot meet self-sufficiency for more than two of the seven essential food groups. Low self-sufficiency and overdependence on a few countries for imports threaten their capability to respond to global shocks, particularly for small states.</p>","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"202 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-05-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144066298","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-05-13DOI: 10.1038/s43016-025-01178-z
{"title":"Effects of processing on the phytochemical composition of protein-rich plant-based foods","authors":"","doi":"10.1038/s43016-025-01178-z","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-025-01178-z","url":null,"abstract":"Plant-based foods are often processed using various techniques to improve their nutritional and sensory properties by modifying their biochemical compositions. Here, the effect of different processing techniques on protein-rich plant-based foods was demonstrated using a non-targeted metabolomics approach and assessed in light of current food processing classifications.","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"51 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-05-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143940240","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}