Climate change, biodiversity loss, and social inequities pose simultaneous, current and future, challenges to food production. Agriculture is inherently both an ecological system and a socioeconomic system where all the socio-ecological components of an agricultural system, from the farm to the surrounding landscape, are tightly interlinked – influencing each other, negatively or positively, through multiple divergent pathways. Accordingly, novel and innovative trans-disciplinary research approaches that connect ecological principles to socially constructed landscapes are required to meet the various environmental and socioeconomic challenges facing agriculture. As a response, agroecology – defined as simultaneously a science, movement, and a practice – bridges natural and social sciences as a way to meet these complex challenges. Agroecology involves the critical connections between the environment and humans through multiple disciplines and perspectives in the natural and social sciences. In this session, we will bring together agroecologists at the forefront of emerging and innovative research who are tackling critical research gaps in agricultural sustainability. Specifically, the session will cover interdisciplinary perspectives from multiple geographies (in the U.S. and beyond) and multiple disciplines (i.e. soil science, insect ecology, environmental sociology, and policy) to illustrate the vital connections between natural science and social science and between research and community engagement needed to meet the challenges facing agricultural production. Altogether, this session will highlight the agroecological pathways to more just and sustainable food systems.