Predicting changes in the suitable habitats of six halophytic plant species in the arid areas of Northwest China

In the context of changes in global climate and land uses, biodiversity patterns and plant species distributions have been significantly affected. Soil salinization is a growing problem, particularly in the arid areas of Northwest China. Halophytes are ideal for restoring soil salinization because of their adaptability to salt stress. In this study, we collected the current and future bioclimatic data released by the WorldClim database, along with soil data from the Harmonized World Soil Database (v1.2) and A Big Earth Data Platform for Three Poles. Using the maximum entropy (MaxEnt) model, the potential suitable habitats of six halophytic plant species (Halostachys caspica (Bieb.) C. A. Mey., Halogeton glomeratus (Bieb.) C. A. Mey., Kalidium foliatum (Pall.) Moq., Halocnemum strobilaceum (Pall.) Bieb., Salicornia europaea L., and Suaeda salsa (L.) Pall.) were assessed under the current climate conditions (average for 1970–2000) and future (2050s, 2070s, and 2090s) climate scenarios (SSP245 and SSP585, where SSP is the Shared Socio-economic Pathway). The results revealed that all six halophytic plant species exhibited the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve values higher than 0.80 based on the MaxEnt model, indicating the excellent performance of the MaxEnt model. The suitability of the six halophytic plant species significantly varied across regions in the arid areas of Northwest China. Under different future climate change scenarios, the suitable habitat areas for the six halophytic plant species are expected to increase or decrease to varying degrees. As global warming progresses, the suitable habitat areas of K. foliatum, S. salsa, and H. strobilaceum exhibited an increasing trend. In contrast, the suitable habitat areas of H. glomeratus, S. europaea, and H. caspica showed an opposite trend. Furthermore, considering the ongoing global warming trend, the centroids of the suitable habitat areas for various halophytic plant species would migrate to different degrees, and four halophytic plant species, namely, S. salsa, H. strobilaceum, H. gbmeratus, and H. capsica, would migrate to higher latitudes. Temperature, precipitation, and soil factors affected the possible distribution ranges of these six halophytic plant species. Among them, precipitation seasonality (coefficient of variation), precipitation of the warmest quarter, mean temperature of the warmest quarter, and exchangeable Na⁺ significantly affected the distribution of halophytic plant species. Our findings are critical to comprehending and predicting the impact of climate change on ecosystems. The findings of this study hold significant theoretical and practical implications for the management of soil salinization and for the utilization, protection, and management of halophytes in the arid areas of Northwest China.