Biogeographical patterns of African plants can predict their response to global change
A new study uses 'zeta diversity', an innovative ecological tool, to measure plant biodiversity, creating new insights into plants' responses to environmental change.
An international research collaboration led by a team of scientists from the Universities of Stellenbosch in South Africa, Leeds in the UK, and Lincoln in New Zealand has recently revealed new insight into the biogeographical patterns of plant species richness and turnover across Africa, shedding light on how biodiversity could respond to future global change.
Lead author Dr Thina Ncube from Stellenbosch University said: “Research of this nature will be increasingly important in future environments impacted by global environmental change mid-to-late century, helping to conserve biodiversity, restore degraded ecosystems, and develop nature-based solutions in Africa.”
The study uses an innovative measure called zeta diversity, developed by co-author Professor Cang Hui, Chair in Mathematical and Theoretical Physical Biosciences at Stellenbosch.
A ‘Bizzy Lizzy’ or Impatiens from the forests of Tanzania, a group that has many rare and restricted range species
Professor Hui explains: “Unlike other measures of species compositional turnover, zeta diversity partitioning quantifies the complete set of diversity components for multiple assemblages, comprehensively representing the spatial structure of multispecies distributions. Zeta diversity may provide new insights on biodiversity patterns, the processes driving them, and their response to environmental change.”
Co-author Dr Helen De Klerk from Lincoln University in New Zealand describes the importance of the collaboration and how scientists in Africa are developing the skills to handle large data sets.
Dr De Klerk said: “Meaningful multi-national partnerships leveraged advances in databases of vascular plants, statistical methods and computational power to analyse biogeographic patterns of regionalisation, or biomes, and turnover between these. Understanding where biodiversity concentrations occur and what drives these patterns of biodiversity can help us promote geospatially focused land management approaches to sustain and protect biodiversity. This project showcased big data skills developed in Africa.”
Professor Jon Lovett from the School of Geography at the University of Leeds adds: “International research partnerships are long-term undertakings. This research started with a worldwide project funded by the Global Environment Facility in 2015 called ‘Spatial Planning for Protected Areas in Response to Climate Change,’ with Stellenbosch and Leeds. The research aims to contribute to achieving Sustainable Development Goal 15 by analysing a big data set to help efforts to reduce biodiversity loss in Africa.”
