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Androctonus Genus Species in Arid Regions:Ecological Niche Models, Geographical Distributions, and Envenomation Risk


Affiliations
1 Department of Biology, Laboratory of Ecology and Environment, Cadi Ayyad University, Marrakesh 40000, PO Box 2390, Morocco
2 Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics Laboratory, B.P. 2390, Cadi Ayyad University, Marrakech 40000, Morocco
3 Department of Biology, Laboratory of Pharmacology, Neurobiology and Behavior, University Cadi Ayyad, Marrakesh, Morocco
 

Aim: The objective of this study was to establish environmental factors related to scorpion species occurrence and their current potential geographic distributions in Morocco, to produce a current envenomation risk map and also to assess the human population at risk of envenomation.

Materials and Methods: In this study, 71 georeferenced points for all scorpion species and nine environmental indicators were used to generate species distribution models in Maxent (maximum entropy modeling of species geographic distributions) version 3.3.3k. The models were evaluated by the area under the curve (AUC), using the omission error and the binomial probability. With the data generated by Maxent, distribution and envenomation risk maps were produced using the “ESRI® ArcGIS 10.2.2 for Desktop” software.

Results: The models had high predictive success (AUC>0.95±0.025). Altitude, slope and five bioclimatic attributes were found to play a significant role in determining Androctonus scorpion species distribution. Ecological niche models (ENMs) showed high concordance with the known distribution of the species. Produced risk map identified broad risk areas for Androctonus scorpion envenomation, extending along Marrakech-Tensift-Al Haouz, Souss-Massa-Draa, and some areas of Doukkala-Abda and Oriental regions.

Conclusion: Considering these findings ENMs could be useful to afford important information on distributions of medically important scorpion species as well as producing scorpion envenomation risk maps.


Keywords

Androctonus Genus, Ecological Niche Models, Morocco, Risk Maps, Scorpion Envenomation.
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  • Androctonus Genus Species in Arid Regions:Ecological Niche Models, Geographical Distributions, and Envenomation Risk

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Authors

Moulay Abdelmonaim El Hidan
Department of Biology, Laboratory of Ecology and Environment, Cadi Ayyad University, Marrakesh 40000, PO Box 2390, Morocco
Oulaid Touloun
Department of Biology, Laboratory of Ecology and Environment, Cadi Ayyad University, Marrakesh 40000, PO Box 2390, Morocco
Abdellah Bouazza
Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics Laboratory, B.P. 2390, Cadi Ayyad University, Marrakech 40000, Morocco
Mehdi Ait Laaradia
Department of Biology, Laboratory of Pharmacology, Neurobiology and Behavior, University Cadi Ayyad, Marrakesh, Morocco
Ali Boumezzough
Department of Biology, Laboratory of Ecology and Environment, Cadi Ayyad University, Marrakesh 40000, PO Box 2390, Morocco

Abstract


Aim: The objective of this study was to establish environmental factors related to scorpion species occurrence and their current potential geographic distributions in Morocco, to produce a current envenomation risk map and also to assess the human population at risk of envenomation.

Materials and Methods: In this study, 71 georeferenced points for all scorpion species and nine environmental indicators were used to generate species distribution models in Maxent (maximum entropy modeling of species geographic distributions) version 3.3.3k. The models were evaluated by the area under the curve (AUC), using the omission error and the binomial probability. With the data generated by Maxent, distribution and envenomation risk maps were produced using the “ESRI® ArcGIS 10.2.2 for Desktop” software.

Results: The models had high predictive success (AUC>0.95±0.025). Altitude, slope and five bioclimatic attributes were found to play a significant role in determining Androctonus scorpion species distribution. Ecological niche models (ENMs) showed high concordance with the known distribution of the species. Produced risk map identified broad risk areas for Androctonus scorpion envenomation, extending along Marrakech-Tensift-Al Haouz, Souss-Massa-Draa, and some areas of Doukkala-Abda and Oriental regions.

Conclusion: Considering these findings ENMs could be useful to afford important information on distributions of medically important scorpion species as well as producing scorpion envenomation risk maps.


Keywords


Androctonus Genus, Ecological Niche Models, Morocco, Risk Maps, Scorpion Envenomation.