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Climate change's effect on plants and animal species is one of the significant concerns of conservation biologists. These changes cause an increase in extinction and changes in the distribution and abundance of species. This research examined the impact of climate change on the habitat of the European Otter (Lutra lutra) in Khuzestan based on habitat modeling in R with climate scenarios and general circulation model MRI-ESM2-0. For this purpose, more than 40 presence points were recorded and 10 climatic and environmental variables were used as input for species distribution models including the Generalized Linear Model (GLM), Generalized Boosting Method (GBM), random forest (RF), and Multivariate Adaptive Regression Splines (MARS). The value of AUC and TSS and the Kappa coefficient indicate the high accuracy and precision of the model. The RF and GBM are the best methods to determine the habitat of the European Otter in Khuzestan. The variables of distance from the river, Annual Mean Temperature (Bio), and Isothermality index had the greatest role in habitat suitability. The 185.9176 Km2 (14.3%) of Khuzestan was identified as a suitable habitat for this species. The prediction of changes in the geographical distribution of the species under the climate scenarios of ssp126, ssp370, and ssp585 showed that the habitat of this species would decrease by 10.37, 10.38 and 11.58%, respectively. According to the results of climate change, it has a significant impact on the distribution range of the species.

A complete, up to date checklist of Alyssum species reported from Iran is presented in this review. The distribution of these species was considered in Iran and in the adjacent countries, too. Additional records were obtained from Flora Iranica, Flora of Turkey and other references. In Iran some species (e. g., Alyssum hezarmasjedensis, A. mozaffarianii, A. persicum, A. polycladum, A. stipitatum, A. turgidum) have very restricted distribution. Iran is the second important locality for the following species: A. anatolicum, A. contemptum, A. filiforme, A. iranicum, A. lycaonicum, A. niveum, A. penjwinense. The other Alyssum species are widespread in Iran and in the adjacent countries.

Ferula microcolea (Boiss.) Boiss. is an endemic plant in Iran that some of its habitats have been destroyed in recent decades. Since the bioclimatic variables which determine its potential distribution, are poorly defined, a specific analysis is needed. In this study, the species distribution modelling was used for reaching these goals: (i) identifying the bioclimatic factors that constrain the distribution of this species in Iran, (ii) generating a potential habitat suitability map for F. microcolea using Maxent (iii) determining the high suitable areas where this species could be present (iv) evaluating the final model. In all, 66 records of F. microcolea in Iran were used as the occurrence data. Nineteen bioclimatic variables were obtained from the WorldClim database and collinear variables were removed in a sequential manner with regard to the ecological knowledge of the plant. The maxent parameters were optimised with ENMeval R package. For evaluating the performance of the Maxent model, the Area under curve value (AUC) was calculated. The results showed that the model performance was excellent. Analysis of variable contribution demonstrated that the distribution of this species is most influenced by the Annual Mean Temperature. We revealed that the area about 22,005.5 km2 is highly suitable for F. microcolea that is principally located in Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari province. Although this region is rich in biodiversity, greater focus should be paid to its conservation. Our findings provide a scientific basis for the habitats conservation of this species in Iran.