Drivers of urban biodiversity in Mexico and joint risks from future urban expansion, climate change, and urban heat island effect

RESEARCH ARTICLE Drivers of urban biodiversity in Mexico and joint risks from future urban expansion, climate change, and urban heat island effect Julia´n A. Velasco1, Carlos Luna-Arangure´ 1, Oscar Caldero´ n-Bustamante1, Alma Mendoza- Ponce2, Francisco Estrada1,2,3, Constantino Gonza´lez-SalazarID1,4* 1 ICAyCC-Instituto de Ciencias de la Atmo´ sfera y Cambio Clima´ tico, Universidad Nacional Auto´ noma de Me´xico, Mexico City, Mexico, 2 PINCC-Programa de Investigacio´n en Cambio Clima´tico, Universidad Nacional Auto´ noma de Me´xico, Mexico City, Mexico, 3 Institute for Environmental Studies, VU Amsterdam, Amsterdam, the Netherlands, 4 C3-Centro de Ciencias de la Complejidad, Universidad Nacional Auto´ noma de Me´xico, Mexico City, Mexico * cgsalazar@atmosfera.unam.mx Abstract Urbanization is a phenomenon where humans concentrate in high densities and consume more per capita energy than in rural areas, imposing high pressures on biodiversity and eco- system services. Although Mexico is recognized as a megadiverse country and there is an understanding of ecological and evolutionary processes underlying this high diversity, only some efforts have been devoted to understanding how urban biodiversity has been shaped. Here, we compiled a set of socioeconomic and ecological variables to explore macroecolo- gical patterns in urban biodiversity across Mexican municipalities. Specifically, we tested the species-area relationships (SAR) between rural and urban areas across municipalities and evaluated the relative role of different socioeconomic and ecological variables driving

urban species richness for terrestrial vertebrates. Finally, we explored the exposure of Mexi- can municipalities to future urban expansion, the urban heat island (UHI) effect, and climate change. Urban and rural settlements show differences in the shape of SAR models. We found that urban area, size of the network of urban protected areas, the number of ecore- gions, and GDP explained the urban total species richness relatively well. Mexican cities in the northeast region may be at a higher risk than others. Based on our analyses, policy- makers should identify priority urban conservation sites in cities with high species richness and low urbanization development. These actions would alleviate future urban biodiversity loss in these growing cities. Introduction Urbanization is a social phenomenon where humans concentrate in high densities and con- sume more energy per capita than in rural areas [1–3]. Urban sprawl generates notable increases in resource demands that are satisfied through a high human impact on adjacent or distant natural resources in rural areas. One expected result of the urbanization processes is PLOS ONE PLOS ONE | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0308522 October 4, 2024 1 / 19 a1111111111 a1111111111 a1111111111 a1111111111 a1111111111 OPEN ACCESS Citation: Velasco JA, Luna-Arangure´ C, Caldero´n- Bustamante O, Mendoza-Ponce A, Estrada F, Gonza´lez-Salazar C (2024) Drivers of urban biodiversity in Mexico and joint risks from future urban expansion, climate change, and urban heat island effect. PLoS ONE 19(10): e0308522. https://

doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0308522 Editor: Bijeesh Kozhikkodan Veettil, Van Lang University: Truong Dai hoc Van Lang, VIET NAM Received: February 19, 2024 Accepted: July 25, 2024 Published: October 4, 2024 Peer Review History: PLOS recognizes the benefits of transparency in the peer review process; therefore, we enable the publication of all of the content of peer review and author responses alongside final, published articles. The editorial history of this article is available here: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0308522 Copyright: © 2024 Velasco et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Data Availability Statement: Data and R codes are publicly accessible using the following link: