Cambio climatico

Ecology Letters, (2012)

doi: 10.1111/j.1461-0248.2011.01736.x

REVIEW AND SYNTHESES

Impacts of climate change on the future of biodiversity
Abstract Many studies in recent years have investigated the effects of climate change on the future of biodiversity. In this review, we first examine the different possible effects of climate change that can operate at individual, population, species,community, ecosystem and biome scales, notably showing that species can respond to climate change challenges by shifting their climatic niche along three non-exclusive axes: time (e.g. phenology), space (e.g. range) and self (e.g. physiology). Then, we present the principal specificities and caveats of the most common approaches used to estimate future biodiversity at global and subcontinentalscales and we synthesise their results. Finally, we highlight several challenges for future research both in theoretical and applied realms. Overall, our review shows that current estimates are very variable, depending on the method, taxonomic group, biodiversity loss metrics, spatial scales and time periods considered. Yet, the majority of models indicate alarming consequences for biodiversity, withthe worstcase scenarios leading to extinction rates that would qualify as the sixth mass extinction in the history of the earth. Keywords Biodiversity, climate change, species extinctions.
Ecology Letters (2012)

´ Celine Bellard,1  Cleo Bertelsmeier,1  Paul Leadley,1 Wilfried Thuiller2 and Franck Courchamp1*
1

´ Ecologie, Systematique & Evolution,

UMR-CNRS 8079, Univ. Paris Sud, OrsayCedex 91405, France
2

Laboratoire dÕEcologie Alpine

´ (LECA), UMR-CNRS 5553, Universite Joseph Fourier, Grenoble 1, 38041 Grenoble Cedex 9, France *Correspondence: E-mail: franck.courchamp@u-psud.fr
 

Equal contribution

INTRODUCTION

BIODIVERSITY AND CLIMATE CHANGE: EFFECTS AND RESPONSES

Predicting the response of biodiversity to climate change has become an extremely activefield of research (e.g. Dillon et al. 2010; Gilman et al. 2010; Pereira et al. 2010; Salamin et al. 2010; Beaumont et al. 2011; Dawson et al. 2011; McMahon et al. 2011). Predictions play an important role in alerting scientists and decision makers to potential future risks, provide a means to bolster attribution of biological changes to climate change and can support the development of proactivestrategies to reduce climate change impacts on biodiversity (Pereira et al. 2010; Parmesan et al. 2011). Although there is relatively limited evidence of current extinctions caused by climate change, studies suggest that climate change could surpass habitat destruction as the greatest global threat to biodiversity over the next few decades (Leadley et al. 2010). However, the multiplicity of approachesand the resulting variability in projections make it difficult to get a clear picture of the future of biodiversity under different scenarios of global climatic change (Pereira et al. 2010). Hence, there is an urgent need to review our current understanding of the effects of climate change on biodiversity and our capacity to project future impacts using models. To this end, we have reviewed both theranges of possible impacts of climate change that operate at individual, population, species, community, ecosystem and biome scales and the different responses that could occur at individual, population or species levels. We then present the principal specificities and caveats of the most common approaches used to model future biodiversity at global and sub-continental scales and we synthesisetheir results focusing on how model combinations are used to project the impacts of climate change on species loss. Finally, we highlight several challenges for future research, from theoretical (e.g. emerging models) and applied (e.g. population conservation and exploitation) realms.

Climate change effects on biodiversity

The multiple components of climate change are anticipated to affect...