Ecological Niche Model for Palicourea jambosioides (Schltdl.) C.M. Taylor in the State of Bahia, Brazil

The Atlantic Forest is a complex of ecosystems of great importance, as it is home to a significant portion of Brazilian biodiversity. The Rubiaceae family is the fourth largest in number of species among the Angiosperms, presenting its most remarkable diversity in the phytogeographic domains of the Amazon and the Atlantic Forest. This study aimed to model the ecological niche of Palicourea jambosioides (Schltdl.) C.M. Taylor in the state of Bahia. Georeferenced occurrence data were obtained from the online databases SpeciesLink and GBIF, as well as consultations with physical herbaria and scientific articles, and were combined with climate information from WorldClim. The statistical validation of the models was performed considering AUC values ≥ 0.7 and TSS ≥ 0.4. The variables that most contributed to the modeling were BIO5 (26.1%), BIO15 (22.6%), BIO10 (15.8%), and BIO3 (15.0%). It was observed that P. jambosioides occurs mainly in areas of seasonal forest and restinga, with temperature and precipitation being the environmental variables with the most significant influence on its distribution. Thus, this study contributes to advancing knowledge about the distribution of the species and can offer subsidies for conservation actions in the state of Bahia.