Over the past 80 years, biotechnology has advanced agriculture, healthcare, and economic development by harnessing biological processes from the organism inward (i.e., from the organ system to the molecular scale). Today’s global challenges, including biodiversity loss, climate change, and pollution, demand a complementary technological expansion inspired by processes operating from the organism outward (i.e., at the levels of populations, communities, ecosystems, and the biosphere).

Understanding how different intensities of timber harvesting affect species richness for plants and animals in North American forests will enable natural resource managers to better control the impacts of harvesting on flora and fauna communities. Previous syntheses have only examined thinning intensity as a categorical variable, comparing low and high intensity. This new meta-analysis examines how thinning intensity affects plant and animal species richness while examining the influence of other factors.

Understanding the effect of fishing activities on marine organism species richness is important for managing fisheries. Previous reviews and meta-analyses have focused on the relationship between bottom-fishing gears and invertebrate species richness, but there is a lack of understanding around other fishing gears (e.g., long lines and gillnets) and other taxa (e.g., ray-finned fishes).

Working forests serve an important role in providing timber products. At the same time, these forests are expected to contribute to mitigating climate change. With new studies being published, the authors performed an updated meta-analysis to synthesize the effects of forest thinning and clearcutting on three carbon pools—plants and roots, organic layer, and mineral soil—as well as examine how these effects interact with thinning intensity and time since harvest.

Evidence assessment—identifying, evaluating, and synthesizing data and findings from previous studies—is important to inform environmental decision-making but can be slow and resource intensive. Users seeking efficiency have developed multiple definitions and methods for rapid evidence assessment (REA), raising concerns about consistency and rigor. To improve consistency and confidence in REA, the authors convened an international group of evidence users and researchers to define REA for environmental applications.

Almost a year after Hurricane Helene poured over western North Carolina, the region is rebuilding—and communities and businesses across the state are reckoning with the increased likelihood of extreme weather events. In June, Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Energy, Environment & Sustainability teamed up with the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality to bring together stakeholders from across the state to develop ideas for rebuilding stronger and safer.

Recent federal updates and activities modernizing regulation have elevated the importance of ecosystem services and clarified guidance for accounting for their value. These changes underscore the crucial role of ecosystem services in federal benefit–cost analysis, provide clear entry points that make it simplify and enhance transparency for agencies and stakeholders to include ecosystem services in benefit–cost analysis, and document advances in the literature demonstrating that ecosystem services can be credibly and robustly included in such analyses.

Federal policy and programs can play a critical role in helping communities—especially those with limited resources—ensure both security and economic vitality in the face of increasing threats from natural hazards. This summary builds on legislative history in the hopes that past priorities can provide some indication of who may be Congressional leaders and where opportunities lie for legislative action to help promote resilience against potential risks.

Federal policy and programs can play a critical role in helping communities—especially those with limited resources—ensure both security and economic vitality in the face of increasing threats from natural hazards. But to get there, the federal government needs a more coordinated approach to empower state and local governments, as well as local institutions and private-sector partners that are working hand in hand with homeowners, businesses, and local and Tribal governments. In this brief, the authors recommend four critical proactive actions the federal government could take to effectively and cost-efficiently prepare the nation for these extreme events and reduce their catastrophic impacts.

Despite growing interest and investment in nature-based solutions such as living shorelines in the United States, it has been difficult to expand their use. One major hurdle is permitting challenges. Florida, North Carolina, and Virginia are three states where living shoreline installations have increased. We examined what policy conditions exist in these locations to enable project permitting, as well as how to address any remaining hurdles.