Research progress on plant diversity in Southwest Asia

Biodiversity cataloging is crucial for biodiversity conservation and natural resource management. In 2015, the Biodiversity Committee of the Chinese Academy of Sciences proposed the “Mapping Asia Plants (MAP)” project, aiming to establish a big data online platform for botanical information in Asia. Southwest Asia is one of the six subregions of MAP. As defined in this paper, the Southwest Asia region includes 19 countries, listed from west to east: Türkiye, Cyprus, Palestine, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Georgia, Yemen, Armenia, Iran, Azerbaijan, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and Oman. The region has complex natural geographical features and diverse terrain, situated in the transition zone between the Palearctic and Afrotropical regions, possessing unique biodiversity and significant biogeographical importance. This paper briefly reviews the progress of compiling floras in Southwest Asia, introduces the existing key floras and checklists of the countries in this region, and describes the current status of vascular plant diversity, aiming to provide baseline data for the MAP project and serve as a reference for researchers in related fields.