Conservation status assessment of banana crop wild relatives using species distribution modelling

Abstract

Aim Crop wild relatives (CWR) are an essential source of genetic material for the improvement of certain traits in related crop species. Despite their importance, increasing public, scientific and political support, large gaps exist in the amount of genetic material collected and conserved of many CWR. Here, we construct a dataset on the distribution of wild banana species (Musa spp.) and assess their risk and conservation status. We deal with the following questions: (a) What areas are potentially suitable for wild banana species? (b) How much of the wild banana diversity is currently at risk or insufficiently conserved ex and in situ? Location Native distribution area of wild banana species, ranging from the north‐eastern states of India to north‐eastern Australia. Methods We assessed the potential environmental range of wild species using a species distribution modelling approach with MaxEnt. Extinction risk was evaluated following IUCN criterion B, and the ex and in situ conservation status was assessed using an indicator for biodiversity and sustainable development targets. Results We found that 11 out of 59 assessed species can be considered as vulnerable and nine as endangered. Highest species richness was found along the border of south China and northern Vietnam, in the north‐eastern states of India and on the Malayan peninsula. Our distribution modelling approach indicates that the northern Indo‐Burmese region has the highest environmental suitability for most wild banana species and that lowland rain forests in general are highly suitable for bananas. Assessment of in and ex situ conservation status indicates that 56 out of 59 assessed species are currently insufficiently conserved ex situ and that 49 are of high priority for further conservation. Additional in situ conservation is of high priority for six species and of medium priority for 40 species. Main conclusions To date, little of the banana CWR are sufficiently conserved both in and ex situ.

Genetic diversity and structure of Musa balbisiana populations in Vietnam and its implications for the conservation of banana crop wild relatives

“…The availability of a high quality reference genome [45] and recent identification of large structural variations between A and B genomes [36] will aid in the development of more optimal breeding of banana cultivars and considerable research has been done on assessing the geographic distribution and genetic diversity of wild M. balbisiana populations [29,[46][47][48][49]. Still, wild populations of the species in their native distribution range are still underexplored, under-conserved, and potentially underused in breeding programs [7,[50][51][52][53].…”

Using seminatural and simulated habitats for seed germination ecology of banana wild relatives

“…When temperatures were consistently warmer, synchronicity was reduced-this may again be a disturbance adaptation. We found this response more evident in M. balbisiana than in M. acuminata, suggesting it may also relate to seasonality as M. balbisiana has a large distribution that includes subtropical seasonal climates (Mertens et al, 2021).…”

“…We sowed seeds in plastic trays (100 × 40 × 10 cm), 3). Compartments were selected because living banana specimens were already growing in them and heating regimes represented ranges found in species distributions (Kallow et al, 2021;Mertens et al, 2021), Semi-NH microclimates (see Section 3), and previous LC studies (Kallow et al, 2021;Stotzky & Cox, 1962;Stotzky et al, 1961).…”

From the Wild to the Cup: Tracking Footprints of the Tea Species in Time and Space

“…the geographic origin of tea should apply high density neutral markers [e.g., genomic single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs)] derived from widely sampled populations in both Assam and Southwest China; such markers would shed light on the fine details of the genetic relationships, hence might help to clarify some aspects regarding geographic origins. In addition, useful insights on the geographic origin of tea can be obtained through ecological niche modeling (ENM), a probabilistic approach that relies on environmental data to predict the spatio-temporal distribution of a given species [e.g., (30)]. However, for the tea species, conclusions from any ENM analysis must be interpreted with caution as the species has undergone extensive and intensive post-domestication artificial selection and breeding, and may therefore violate the "niche conservatism" assumption.…”