The Chelonian lineage has been exposed to several climate change events along its evolutionary history, but the rapid contemporary change in climate patterns has the potential to erode turtle populations. This study focuses on (1) evaluating the climatically suitable area available for 15 species of mud turtles of the genus Kinosternon, and on (2) assessing whether or not these species retain their ancestral climate niche. Occurrence data was collected for these species and, using the Maxent algorithm and WorldClim bioclimatic variables, suitable present and future climatic niche areas were modeled. In addition, we also carried out climatic niche similarity analyses between pairs of species to evaluate whether these conserve their climatic niche. Our models suggest that most species of Kinosternon will lose a high proportion of their suitable habitat in the future. Most mud turtle species seem to conserve their climatic niche, suggesting the prevalence of niche conservatism in the group. Our results indicate that several mud turtle species could be at severe risk of disappearing over the next few decades due to the loss of climatically suitable areas and of the conservation of their climatic niches.

中文翻译：

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气候变化对 Kinosternon 属龟的影响（Testudines：Kinosternidae）：栖息地适宜性和气候生态位保守性的评估

Chelonian 谱系在其进化历史上已经暴露于几次气候变化事件中，但当代气候模式的快速变化有可能侵蚀海龟种群。本研究侧重于 (1) 评估 15 种 Kinosternon 属泥龟的气候适宜区域，以及 (2) 评估这些物种是否保留其祖先的气候生态位。收集了这些物种的发生数据，并使用 Maxent 算法和 WorldClim 生物气候变量，对合适的当前和未来气候生态位区域进行了建模。此外，我们还进行了成对物种之间的气候生态位相似性分析，以评估这些物种是否保护了它们的气候生态位。我们的模型表明，未来大多数 Kinosternon 物种将失去大部分合适的栖息地。大多数泥龟物种似乎都在保护它们的气候生态位，这表明该群体普遍存在生态位保守主义。我们的研究结果表明，由于气候适宜区域的丧失和气候生态位的保护，几种泥龟物种可能在未来几十年内面临消失的严重风险。