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<p><strong>Background.</strong> Considering the current importance of recognizing the potential of traditional agroecosystems, including homegardens in the sustainable development of many rural and urban communities, strategists and scientists around the world are showing increasing interest in their study. <strong>Objective.</strong> Analyze the scientific literature relevant to the scope and constraints of homegardens (HGs), and to identify gaps and research perspectives, especially for indigenous communities in Mexico. <strong>Methodology.</strong> A total of 335 studies published in the last decades (1986-2020) were collected from different databases using predefined keywords. All publications were organized and stored in the Zotero (2018) program. The trends of all the publications were analyzed using NVivo 12 Plus software. <strong>Results.</strong> The number of publications increased from the year 2000. About 70% of the publications analyzed were research articles in english. Of the total studies examined 239 (71.35%) were conducted in different parts of the world, of which 30% from Asia and the remaining 96 (28.65%) from Mexico, primarily in tropics. Most of these studies focused on ecological (62.98%), economic (20.29%), cultural (13.43%), social (7.46%) and multifunctional features (12.23%) of HGs. The same pattern was identified in the case of Mexico, with studies of 10.74%, 5.07%, 5.67%, 0.597%, and 3.58% focused on ecological, economic, cultural, social and the multifunctionality features of HGs respectively. <strong>Implications. </strong>The analysis of the scope and limitations of HGs contributes to identifying the need to carry out transdisciplinary research that reflects their whole dynamics as agroecosystems, in which, in addition to the ecological environment, there are various cultural aspects considered important in the indigenous communities of Mexico.<strong> Conclusions. </strong>The publications emphasized the importance of homegardens to provide multiple ecosystem functions and services to enhance human well-being. However, future research should reevaluate HGs based on a holistic multi-functional agriculture approach to promote them as one of the strategies conducive to improve family well-being. Also, it is suggested to evaluate the degree of sustainability of HGs based on its resilience and adaptation capacity to confront current challenges.</p>

<p><strong>Background</strong>. Current research advances related to carbon and nitrogen dynamic and the environmental problems, that impact on the socioeconomic functions of agroforestry systems, and the importance of their floristic diversity, have not yet been analyzed in an integrated way for coffee agroforestry systems in Mexico. <strong>Objective</strong>. It consisted to identify the areas in need of research on carbon and nitrogen dynamic in coffee agroforestry systems in Mexico. <strong>Methodology</strong>. Publications were compiled until 2018, on the potential of agroforestry systems to keep carbon and nitrogen reserves, which influence in the carbon and nitrogen biogeochemical cycles, and greenhouse gas emissions, as well as socioeconomic importance, productive diversification, and the problems faced by small producers with their ability to adapt to climatic variations. This information was organized and subjected to a cluster analysis with the NVivo12 program, which allowed evaluating the frequency of research for each topic and the relationship between them. <strong>Results</strong>. 43% of publications are related to carbon storage and 13% on nitrogen dynamic in agroforestry systems, while 37 and 35% evidenced their environmental importance and ability to adapt to climatic variations, respectively. The socioeconomic characteristics show that there is a productive diversity, a floristic composition in multi-strata and traditional management, which affects on carbon and nitrogen dynamic, since the quality of organic matter depends on the diversity of the floristic composition of the system and the type of management applied by the producer. <strong>Implications</strong>. At present this analysis contributes to detect the advances of investigations on carbon and nitrogen dynamic to generate integrated research according to the Mexican national reality. <strong>Conclusions</strong>. Researchs should focus on: (1) the productive diversification and carbon and nitrogen dynamic; (2) effect of socioeconomic variations on carbon and nitrogen dynamic; (3) degree of sensitivity of carbon and nitrogen dynamic to climatic variations; (4) identification of adaptive capacities, that allows carbon and nitrogen dynamic to be maintained.</p>

Las comunidades indígenas Mayas de la península de Yucatán han practicado la antigua tradición de agricultura familiar, en particular los huertos caseros, para garantizar su seguridad alimentaria. Con el objetivo de mejorar la práctica tradicional considerando paradigmas de la ciencia moderna, por una parte, se colectaron datos para def inir la complejidad estructural y diversidad funcional a partir de 20 huertos familiares en cinco comunidades: X - Maben, X - Pichil, X - Yatil, San José II y Melchor Ocampo; y por otra, se organizaron grupos de discusión para dilucidar la estrategia de gestión practicada por las comunidades nativas. Los resultados mostraron que los huertos son manejados principalmente por las mujeres. También mostraron que el propósito principal del crecimiento y mantenimiento de los huertos familiares es garantizar la producción de alimentos nutritivos durante todo el año. Y, por último que los huertos caseros también sirven para propósitos secundarios tales como la provisión de productos y servicios para la medicina tradicional. El estudio sugiere que se debe de promover e invertir en huertos caseros para mejorar las estrategias de desarrollo incluyente en ambientes socio-culturales y biofísicos similares.