Impacts of climate change on Capparis spinosa L. based on ecological niche modeling

Abstract

Recent changes in climate are transforming the situation of life on Earth, including impacting the conservation status of many plant and animal species. This study aims to evaluate potential impacts of climate change on a medicinal plant that is known to be heat-tolerant, Capparis spinosa L. We used ecological niche modeling to estimate current and future potential distributions for the species, considering two emissions scenarios and five climate models for two time periods (2050 and 2070). The results in terms of areal coverage at different suitability levels in the future were closely similar to its present-day distribution; indeed, only minor differences existed in highly suitable area, with increases of only 0.2–0.3% in suitable area for 2050 and 2070 under representative concentration pathway 4.5. Given that climate-mediated range shifts in the species are expected to be minor, conservation attention to this species can focus on minimizing local effects of anthropogenic activity.