A report published in Science Magazine warned that most coral reefs will not survive the rapid increases in global temperatures and atmospheric CO2 that are forecast during this century by the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change, unless drastic action is taken to curb CO2 emissions, the Coral Reef Targeted Research and Capacity Building for Management Program said Thursday in a release.

"This crisis is on our doorstep, not decades away," lead author Ove Hoegh-Guldberg of The University of Queensland, Australia, said. "The livelihoods of 100 million people living along the coasts of tropical developing countries will be among the first major casualties of rising levels of carbon in the atmosphere."

Hoegh-Guldberg said increased CO2 not only warms the climate but it also dissolves in sea water making it more acidic, which decreases the ability of corals to produce the calcium carbonate that provides the framework of coral reefs.