Europe's southernmost interglacial refugia as sentinels for the local extinction of mountain conifers Gómez Zotano, José Pardo Martínez, Rubén Olmedo Cobo, José Antonio Alba Sánchez, María Francisca Charcoal Orophile forests Paleo-ecological approach Conservation Western Baetic System Iberian Peninsula This research has been supported by a contract for University Teacher Training (Formación de Profesorado Universitario) (Ref. 18/03023) from the Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports (Ministerio de Educación, Cultura y Deportes del Gobierno de España), and research projects financed by the State Research Agency (SRA) and European Regional Development Fund (ERDF): PALEOPINSAPO (CSO2017-83576-P), MED-REFUGIA (RTI2018-101714-B-I00) and TED2021-132631B-I00; Andalusian Plan for Research, Development and Innovation: Oromed-Refugia (P18-RT- 4963); and ERDF Opera- tional Programme in Andalusia (EU regional programme): ForestMed (A-RNM-688-UGR20). The Serrania de Ronda is an exceptional palaeoecological laboratory for studying the dynamics of vegetation over time, due to its strategic geographical location at a biogeographical crossroads and its proven historical legacy. Many of the mountains that form part of this territory are today practically deforested, such as Sierra Blanca, whose geographic location at the heart of the Serranía de Ronda means that it has enormous potential as a bio- geographical crossroads: the occasional presence of Abies pinsapo, Pinus pinaster and Quercus rotundifolia suggests that it was once covered by a mixed forest of conifers and broad-leaved trees. The lack of environmental research in Sierra Blanca has facilitated the installation of large quarries, which have led to its exclusion from the Sierra de las Nieves National Park, which was created in 2021. We applied the pedoanthracological methodology, which has enabled us to discover paleo-populations of A. pinsapo and Pinus sylvestris-type. The results confirm that co- niferous forests previously covered a much wider area during the Holocene. These findings reinforce the role of Sierra Blanca as a high-altitude refuge for conifers during the warm stages of the Holocene and as a sentinel for the local extinction of mountain conifers. This information could help improve its management and conservation. 2023-06-01T09:32:57Z 2023-06-01T09:32:57Z 2023-03-18 journal article J. Gómez-Zotano, R. Pardo-Martínez, J.A. Olmedo-Cobo et al. Europe's southernmost interglacial refugia as sentinels for the local extinction of mountain conifers. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 313 (2023) 104877. [https://doi.org/10.1016/j.revpalbo.2023.104877] https://hdl.handle.net/10481/82093 10.1016/j.revpalbo.2023.104877 eng http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ open access Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 Internacional Elsevier