Safeguarding a national treasure: Modeling the climate-driven habitat shift of the national key protected Aquilaria sinensis in China

Aquilaria sinensis is a precious medicinal plant endemic to China and the only native species capable of producing agarwood in the country. Due to the continuously rising global market prices of agarwood, wild A. sinensis populations have been subjected to predatory logging for excessive profits, leading to a sharp decline in their natural resources. However, market demand for agarwood continues to grow, creating an urgent need to rapidly expand A. sinensis cultivation. In this context, identifying the future potential suitable habitats of A. sinensis will help guide its conservation and cultivation to meet market demands. We employed the MaxEnt model to predict the future geographical distribution of A. sinensis across China. Key findings include: The optimized MaxEnt model (RM = 2, FC = LQH) demonstrated high accuracy (AUC = 0.987 ± 0.005), with annual mean temperature (bio1 > 21.75°C), temperature annual range (bio7 < 21.26°C), and precipitation of the driest month (20.78 ≤ bio14 ≤ 35.22 mm) as dominant drivers. Under the baseline period (1970–2000), suitable habitats (12,891 km², 0.13 % of China) were concentrated in Guangdong and Hainan, with fragmented highly suitable areas (2076 km²). Under the SSP1–2.6 scenario, the overall suitable habitat area decreased by nearly half (48.93 %) by the 2050 s but rebounded by 19.65 % (2090 s), with stable centroid positions. Under the SSP5–8.5 scenario, low/moderate suitability areas expanded (2050 s: +5.87 %), but high-suitability habitats contracted (2090 s: −58.67 %), with centroids shifting northeastward (peak: 230.24 km by 2070 s), Which demonstrate current hotspots in Guangdong and Hainan risk becoming climatically unsuitable, while marginal regions (e.g., Fujian) may gain transient suitability. The findings of this study can guide future conservation efforts and plantation site selection for A. sinensis. • First optimized MaxEnt model for A. sinensis , achieving high accuracy (AUC = 0.987 ± 0.005, 0.917 ± 0.099). • Key drivers for A. sinensis: bio1, bio7, bio14, uvb2 and uvb4. • In SSP1-2.6: the centroid is stable. In SSP5-8.5: the centroid is shifted NE (peak: 230.23 km by 2070 s).