In a controlled laboratory setting, researchers discovered that cockroaches — among the most adaptable creatures on Earth — died at more than twice the rate when fed exclusively ultra-processed human foods compared to those eating whole foods. The finding, modest in scale but striking in implication, suggests that the industrial transformation of food carries consequences that ripple beyond human health into the urban ecosystems we share with other species. It is a quiet reminder that what we have engineered to feed ourselves may be reshaping the living world around us in ways we are only begi