Purpose The 89th Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) Discussion Forum (DF) on the use of prospective LCA (pLCA) to support sustainability transitions of the agri-food sector was held on the 4th of February 2025 in Zurich. Methods This paper summarizes the main discussion points and challenges identified during the 89th LCA DF related to pLCA in the agri-food sector. Results The presentations highlighted recent progress in inventory an...

Global change is accelerating biological invasions, making it crucial to understand how species adapt in new environments to improve management strategies. Genomic data provide valuable insights into adaptation through genotype‐environment association (GEA) studies, which identify genes and biological processes tied to invasion success, and through geometric genomic offset (gGO) statistics, which estimate genetic (mal)adaptati...

Uncertainties on species taxonomy and distribution are major factors hampering efficient conservation planning in the current context of biodiversity erosion, even concerning widespread and abundant species in relatively well‐studied regions. Species delimitation have long been based on phylogenetic analyses of a small number of standard markers, but accurate lineage identification through this approach can be hampered by inco...

Black rat ( Rattus rattus ), brown rat ( Rattus norvegicus ), and house mouse ( Mus musculus ) are known to be among the most common anthropophilic rodent species in cities worldwide. These species are responsible for the destruction of domestic and industrial materials, considerable damage to food stocks as well as zoonotic pathogens circulation and transmission to humans and animals. These invasive species have disseminated...

The secreted peptide adropin is highly expressed in human brain tissues and correlates with RNA and proteomic risk indicators for dementia. Here we report that plasma adropin concentrations predict risk for cognitive decline in the Multidomain Alzheimer Preventive Trial (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier, NCT00672685; mean age 75.8y, SD = 4.5 years, 60.2% female, n = 452). Cognitive ability was evaluated using a composite cognitiv...

Molecular markers produced by next‐generation sequencing ( NGS ) technologies are revolutionizing genetic research. However, the costs of analysing large numbers of individual genomes remain prohibitive for most population genetics studies. Here, we present results based on mathematical derivations showing that, under many realistic experimental designs, NGS of DNA pools from diploid individuals allows to estimate the allele f...

Evolution may improve the invasiveness of populations, but it often remains unclear whether key adaptation events occur after introduction into the recipient habitat (i.e. post‐introduction adaptation scenario), or before introduction within the native range (i.e. prior‐adaptation scenario) or at a primary site of invasion (i.e. bridgehead scenario). We used a multidisciplinary approach to determine which of these three scenar...

The invasive ant species Wasmannia auropunctata displays both ecologically dominant and non‐dominant populations within its native range. Three factors could theoretically explain the ecological dominance of some native populations of W. auropunctata : (i) its clonal reproductive system, through demographic and/or adaptive advantages; (ii) its unicolonial social organization, through lower intraspecific and efficient interspec...

Aim To investigate the phylogeographical structure of the Guinea multimammate mouse, Mastomys erythroleucus (Temminck, 1853), a widespread murid rodent in sub‐Saharan (Sahel and Sudan) savannas, for a better understanding of the impacts of geographical and historical factors on the evolutionary history of this species, in the context of the growing database of phylogeographical studies of African savanna mammal species. Locati...

The potential effect of population outbreaks on within and between genetic variation of populations in pest species has rarely been assessed. In this study, we compare patterns of genetic variation in different sets of historically frequently outbreaking and rarely outbreaking populations of an agricultural pest of major importance, the migratory locust, Locusta migratoria . We analyse genetic variation within and between 24 p...