Simulating last glacial and postglacial distributions of African tropical trees with a dynamic vegetation model.

Climate change and human pressure threaten species richness of African tropical forests. Understanding how the past climate changes have shaped the current distribution and composition of African rainforests can certainly help to the ecosystem conservation in the future. This topic is addressed in the framework of the multi-disciplinary AFRIFORD project (Genetic and palaeoecological signatures of African rainforest dynamics: pre-adapted to change?, http://www.ulb.ac.be/facs/sciences/afriford/). In parallel to genetic and palynological analyses, the CARAIB dynamic vegetation model is applied at the level of African tropical plant species to simulate change in their distributions from the Last Glacial Maximum (21,000 years BP) to the present in sub-Saharan Africa. We prepared a set of about a hundred species, mostly composed of tropical tree species (evergreen/deciduous, cool/warm taxa) for which we compiled observed occurrence data (e.g.., RAINBIO database), determined climatic requirements and gathered some specific traits (e.g., TRY database).
From LGM to present time, the vegetation model is forced with the 1-kyr snapshot outputs of the HadCM3 climate model. Statistically downscaled at a spatial resolution of 0.5°, we only kept modelled past anomalies that we added to the GSWP3 (20 CR) climate data chosen as the reference for the historical period. Sub-Saharan simulations are performed with CARAIB forced by these climatic projections to simulate the net primary productivity of the species over time and space. We analyse the modelled changes in tropical forest composition and extension as well as in the distribution of individual species whose glacial refugia and postglacial dynamics remain poorly known.