Predicting potential suitable habitat for Ensete glaucum (Roxb.) Cheesman using MaxEnt modelling

Abstract

Ecological niche models (ENMs) and species distribution models (SDMs) are widely used to predict suitable habitat for plants and animals. In the present study, we used MaxEnt ecological niche modelling to identify the potential suitable habitat for Ensete glaucum—a pseudo banana species found in Northeast India, Yunnan region of China, Southeast Asia, and Papua New Guinea. Fifty-one occurrence records along with 19 bioclimatic and three topographic variables were used for the modelling. The model accuracy was tested using the area under the receiver operating curve (AUC) metric, and each variable's contribution was estimated using a Jackknife test. Highly suitable regions were observed in the Indo-Burma region with an area of 58,371 km2, while less suitable regions were observed in most of the countries of Southeast Asia. The potential habitat suitability of E. glaucum was mainly influenced by three bioclimatic variables (precipitation of warmest quarter, temperature annual range, and mean diurnal range) and one topographic variable (slope). The predicted suitable habitat regions (high, medium, and low) can be used for future explorations to study the morphological and genetic diversity in E. glaucum and to conserve the genetically diverse and vulnerable populations of this banana crop relative.