Sensitivity of wild plants to climate change

Measuring and modelling the response (sensitivity) of wild plants to current and future climate is crucial to predict future biodiversity and ecological assets. Our research group is using a range of experimental approaches to address this goal. To predict range shifts in plant species under climate change scenarios, we use species distribution models (SDMs). This approach is applied to native species of conservation interest and to alien taxa, in order to check the predictive power of SDM for future invasiveness, when used on early detected alien taxa. Another line of investigation deals with changes in breeding system and seed ecology promoted by climate change. We also evaluate the impact of past natural climatic changes in plant evolution and, finally, our research deals with the study of plant functional traits in relation to climate change.