Volume 5 Issue 5, May 2022

Most cities lack holistic monitoring and green infrastructure to mitigate pollution in urban runoff. We call for systematic characterization of runoff and more widespread treatment to protect biodiversity and human health. This challenge requires data-driven, adapted, low-cost and sustainable solutions for dense urban centres.

The world is facing a sand crisis, as booming sand use poses global sustainability challenges. A study now presents a blueprint for a less sand-demanding future, where synergistic material-efficiency strategies are crucial for curbing sand demand.

In the global transition to sustainable development, policy coherence is key. A new study highlights the equal importance of policy dynamism over time — how policymakers must anticipate national advances in sustainability to meet shifting strategic needs.

Understanding interactions between people and nature is increasingly vital. This Perspective argues that synthesizing concepts and theories from diverse disciplines is crucial, and suggests a conceptual framework for unifying this effort and science.

Agriculture can reduce environmental pressures and tackle poverty and related injustices. Showing examples of agricultural systems that do so while producing food and energy, this Perspective calls for a refocused debate away from the misleading ‘fuel versus food’ dichotomy.

Sand for building material is a vital but increasingly scarce resource. Demand for sand is projected to increase substantially in the coming decades, particularly in lower-income countries. Strategic modifications to building practices, however, can reduce global building sand demand by up to 50%.

Forest conservation contributes to climate change mitigation and delivers a host of other benefits to society, but such benefits are usually assessed qualitatively at the project level. This study provides a quantitative assessment of multiple benefits from forest carbon projects across Southeast Asia.

There is considerable debate on the effect that humans have on streamflow. While annual streamflow trends are driven predominantly by climate, human activity works to both amplify and dampen the seasonal trends of managed streamflows across North America.

Superblocks have captivated the sustainability community since they were pioneered in Barcelona, but research has been limited. This study looks at the potential for superblocks and miniblocks across various urban centres and types

Artificial intelligence methods can help biodiversity conservation planning in a rapidly evolving world. A framework based on reinforcement learning quantifies the trade-off between the costs and benefits of area and biodiversity protection and achieves better solutions with empirical data than alternative methods.

In East Africa the emergence of the potato cyst nematode (PCN) Globodera rostochiensis threatens potato production. Wrapping seed potatoes with a lignocellulose banana-paper matrix reduces the impact of PCN and leads to improved yields, suggesting a sustainable solution to crop root pests.

The development of innovative packaging materials could contribute to greater sustainability in the food and beverage industry. Here the authors report squid-skin-inspired metallized composite materials that show adaptive infrared and dynamic thermoregulatory properties, and could be manufactured in a scalable way.

Using different high-resolution satellite datasets, this study analyses gross forest carbon loss associated with forest removal over the tropics during the twenty-first century focusing on regional fluxes and trends, as well as drivers of loss, both aspects rarely studied in previous work.

SDG interactions have been a focus of research for some time now, and this analysis finds a dynamic and nonlinear change in how the SDGs interact with each other as a nation progresses towards sustainability.