Distribution Pattern and Correlation With Main Environmental Factors of Higher Plant Diversity in Northwest Yunnan

The spatial distribution pattern of species diversity has always been one of the research hotspots in macroecology and biogeography. Northwest Yunnan is one of the regions with the richest biodiversity in China, and the researches on distribution pattern of species diversity and its correlation with main environmental factors have great significance for decision-making on biodiversity conservation. 18 counties in Northwest Yunnan were taken as basic research units, based on the county biodiversity background survey data, and ArcGIS 10.1 software was applied to analyze the diversity and distribution pattern of higher plants for each unit. Furthermore, linear regression analysis was performed to determine the relationship between species density and influencing factors including geographical factorslongitude(LONG), latitude(LAT), altitudinal variation(VALT), average altitude(ALT) and climatic factorsmean annual temperature(MAT), mean annual precipitation(MAP). All statistical analyses were performed by using the SPSS Statistics 22.0 software. It has been found that:(1) The diversity of higher plants increases from south to north in Northwest Yunnan; (2) LAT and VALT have significant correlation on the distribution pattern of higher plants diversity; while the correlation with other factors, including LONG, ALT, MAT and MAP, is not significant with higher plants diversity in this region. As a result, it indicates that the distribution pattern of higher plant diversity in Northwest Yunnan may be mainly related to two major geographical factors:LAT and VALT.