Report |
Corresponding author: Denys Vynokurov ( denys.vynokurov@gmail.com ) Academic editor: Wolfgang Willner
© 2023 Javier Loidi, Gonzalo Navarro-Sánchez, Denys Vynokurov.
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Citation:
Loidi J, Navarro-Sánchez G, Vynokurov D (2023) A vector map of the world’s terrestrial biotic units: subbiomes, biomes, ecozones and domains. Vegetation Classification and Survey 4: 59-61. https://doi.org/10.3897/VCS.99167
|
A vector map of biotic units encompassing the entire terrestrial area of the earth is provided. It contains a hierarchical system of domains, ecozones, biomes and subbiomes, as a large-scale description of the terrestrial ecosystems. The map can be used for different analysis, including monitoring of climate change.
biogeography, biome, biotic unit, climate, domain, Earth, ecozone, GIS vector map, subbiome
In a previous paper, we proposed a classification of biotic units (biomes sensu lato) which encompasses the entire terrestrial area of our planet and helps to explain and understand the general patterns of its biodiversity (
The map was created and used in the work on the climatic definitions of the world’s terrestrial biomes (
The map contains GIS vector layers (in a zip archive) with polygons classified to the level of subbiomes, biomes, ecozones and domains. Polygons have been drawn manually using QGIS software (
The attribute table contains the following fields: fid (polygon id), subbiome (code of subbiome), biome (code of biome), ecozone (code of ecozone), domain (code of domain), area_km2 (area of a polygon in km2 in a World Cylindrical Equal Area projection, ESRI: 54034), subbiome_n (name of subbiome), biome_n (name of biome), ecozone_n (name of ecozone), domain_n (name of domain).
Distribution of the subbiomes across the world in the Mollweide projection is presented in Figure
The largest subbiome of the Earth is 8b Tropical pluviseasonal forests and woodlands (21,532,324.6 km2 or 16.2%), followed by 2a Lowland boreal Taiga (16,964,468.7 km2 or 12.7%) and 9a Tropical rain forests (15,042,477 km2 or 11.3%). Among the biomes, the largest is 8 Biome of the tropical pluviseasonal forests and shrublands (29,576,514.8 km2 or 22.2%), followed by 7 Biome of the deserts and semi-deserts of arid regions (26,046,887.6 km2 or 19.6%) and 2 Biome of the boreal forest (19,716,082.4 km2 or 14.8%). On the highest hierarchical level, the main biotic units are domains. The Cryocratic Domain occupies 23.2% of the land surface, Mexocratic 23.7%, Xerocratic 19.6%, and Thermocratic 33.5%, making Thermocratic the largest domain on the Earth.
Domains | Ecozones | Biomes | Subbiomes | Area in km2 | Area in % |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
A. Cryocratic Domain of the cold climates | AA. Polar and boreal ecozone | 1. Biome of the tundra | 1a. Polar tundra | 7918667.27 | 5.94401492 |
1b. Tundras of the temparate mountains in cryoro belt | 2538587.22 | 1.90554796 | |||
1c. Tundras of the tropical mountains in cryoro belt | 798810.781 | 0.59961393 | |||
2. Biome of the boreal forest | 2a. Lowland boreal Taiga | 16964468.7 | 12.7340942 | ||
2b. Forests and shrublands of the temperate oro belt | 2751613.61 | 2.06545266 | |||
B. Mesocratic Domain of the temperate climates (incl. tropical mountains) | BA. Temperate ombroestival ecozone | 3. Biome of the temperate deciduous forests | 3a. Temperate deciduous forests | 10545548.1 | 7.91583899 |
4. Biome of the temperate pluvial evergreen forest, shrublands and grasslands | 4a. Lauroid evergreen forest of the lowlands | 4465646.76 | 3.35206292 | ||
4b. Conifer coastal forests | 207387.739 | 0.15567213 | |||
4c. Tropical montane cloud lauroid and conifer evergreen forest | 2316614.12 | 1.73892758 | |||
BB. Temperate aridiestival ecozone | 5. Biome of the temperate aridiestival evergreen forests and shrublands | 5a. Oceanic scleropyllous-microphyllous evergreen forests and shrublands (Mediterranean) | 2202248.53 | 1.65308096 | |
5b. Continental scrub and woodlands | 2755406.8 | 2.06829995 | |||
5c. Patagonian shrubland | 1065122.51 | 0.79951637 | |||
BC. Temperate hipercontinental steppic ecozone | 6. Biome of the steppe | 6a. Forest-steppe | 2879666.73 | 2.16157358 | |
6b. Grass-steppe | 5145181.96 | 3.86214463 | |||
C. Xerocratic Domain of the arid climates | CA. Ecozone of the deserts and semi-deserts of arid regions | 7. Biome of the deserts and semi-deserts of arid regions | 7a. Cold deserts and semi-deserts | 5553316.37 | 4.16850389 |
7b. Temperate deserts and semi-deserts | 10136823.5 | 7.60903673 | |||
7c. Warm deserts and semi-deserts | 10356747.7 | 7.77411917 | |||
D. Thermocratic Domain of the warm climates | DA. Tropical pluviseasonal, rainy and dry seasons | 8. Biome of the tropical pluviseasonal forests and shrublands | 8a. Tropical xeric shrublands and woodlands | 8044190.16 | 6.03823658 |
8b. Tropical pluvisesonal forests and woodlands | 21532324.6 | 16.1628787 | |||
DB. Tropical pluvial, rainy all the year round ecozone | 9. Biome of the tropical rain forests | 9a. Tropical rain forests | 15042478 | 11.2913841 |