Global Invasion Risk Assessment of Prosopis juliflora at Biome Level: Does Soil Matter?

SIMPLE SUMMARY: Invasive plant species are one of the major threats to biodiversity and cause the loss of natural habitats. Invasive Mesquite plant was continuing to spread all over the world and invaded most of the forest-shrubland biomes. We aimed to evaluate the contribution of soil and huaman-influence factors and climatic factors to the distribution dynamics and expansion of Mesquite invasive plant. Also, it aimed at ranking the threatened areas in each global biome. Our findings revealed that the invasion risk increases with temperature, soil alkalinity, and clay fractions. This study would provide great insights into prioritization and management guidelines to monitor the expansion and invasion risk of Mesquite plant in the whole world. ABSTRACT: Prosopis juliflora is one of the most problematic invasive trees in tropical and subtropical regions. Understanding driving forces affecting the potential global distribution would help in managing its current and future spread. The role of climate on the global spatial distribution of P. juliflora has been well studied, but little is known about the role of soil and human impacts as potential drivers. Here, we used maximum entropy (MaxEnt) for species distribution modelling to understand the role of climate (C), soil (S) and human impacts (H), C+S, and C+S+H in controlling the potential invasion range of P. juliflora, and to project its global potential invasive risk. We defined the top threatened global biomes, as predicted by the best-selected model. The incorporation of the edaphic factors improved the model performance and enhanced the accuracy of the outcome. Our findings revealed that the potential invasion risk increases with increases in mean temperature of the driest quarter (Bio9), soil alkalinity and clay fractions. Arid and semi-arid lands are at the highest risk of invasion than other moist biomes.