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Predictive modeling of the potential natural vegetation pattern in northeast China

  • Original Article
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Ecological Research

Abstract

Based on the characteristics of natural vegetation distribution in northeast China, using multivariate analysis and geographical information system technology, we established a regional ‘vegetation–environment’ model to simulate geographical distribution of 16 natural vegetation types under present environmental conditions, representing the potential natural vegetation (PNV) of northeast China, on the basis of digital maps of seven environmental variables including climate and topography. Comparison of simulated PNVs distributions with the actual natural vegetation distribution indicated a good agreement, with overall predictive accuracy of 66.9% and overall Kappa value of 0.67. The predictions of model, however, were poor, for only 0.62 of AUC value was yielded. The current resolution and accuracy of the model can be applied to simulate and map the natural vegetation pattern at the regional scale and also used to analyze the effect of climatic changes on natural vegetation.

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Acknowledgments

This study was financed by the National Key Basic Planning Project of China (No. 2007CB106807; No. 2007CB416601), the National Natural Science Fund of China (No. 40861002), and the Scientific Research Fund of Inner Mongolia (No. 200711020603). We thank Prof. J. M. Niu and J.J. Dong for their help with the software application and Prof. Z.L. Liu and Prof. Z.Y. Zhu for their valuable comments on the manuscript. We also thank two anonymous referees for their useful comments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Life Sciences, Inner Mongolia University, No.235 DaXue West Road, 010021, Hohhot, People’s Republic of China

    Huamin Liu, Lixin Wang, Jie Yang, Cunzhu Liang, Wei Wang & Yumei Lv

  2. Graduate School for International Development and Cooperation, Hiroshima University, 1-5-1 Kagamiyama, Higashi-Hiroshima, 739-8529, Japan

    Lixin Wang & Nabukazu Nakagoshi

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  1. Huamin Liu
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Correspondence to Huamin Liu.

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Liu, H., Wang, L., Yang, J. et al. Predictive modeling of the potential natural vegetation pattern in northeast China. Ecol Res 24, 1313–1321 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11284-009-0616-3

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