Climate‐driven changes to environmental conditions are driving severe declines of coral reef ecosystems. Current climate vulnerability estimates commonly focus on ocean warming and typically overlook ecological responses or use broad proxies to represent responses, leading to management decisions based on incomplete views of coral reef futures. We explore four underdeveloped aspects of climate vulnerability assessments and make the following recommendations: (1) use climate projections based on changes in global warming as future scenarios in place of the more common emissions scenarios; (2) include available high‐resolution projections for climate variables in addition to thermal stress; (3) combine projected climate stressors accounting for uncertainty in future outcomes; and (4) quantitatively assess historical and project future ecological sensitivity and adaptive capacity of corals to multiple stressors. We demonstrate how this framework can be used to reduce uncertainty in projected climate vulnerability and facilitate targeted investment in managing reefs most likely to endure climatic disturbances.

中文翻译：

---

珊瑚保护需要生态气候变化脆弱性评估

由气候驱动的环境条件变化正在推动珊瑚礁生态系统的严重衰退。当前对气候脆弱性的估计通常集中在海洋变暖上，并且通常忽略了生态响应或使用广泛的代理来表示响应，从而导致基于对珊瑚礁未来的不完整看法的管理决策。我们探讨了气候脆弱性评估的四个欠发达方面，并提出以下建议：（1）使用基于全球变暖变化的气候预测作为未来情景，代替更常见的排放情景；（2）除热应力外，还包括针对气候变量的可用高分辨率预测；（3）结合预测气候压力因素，以解释未来结果的不确定性；（4）定量评估历史和项目未来的生态敏感性以及珊瑚对多种压力源的适应能力。我们演示了如何使用此框架来减少预计的气候脆弱性的不确定性，并促进有针对性的投资来管理最有可能遭受气候干扰的珊瑚礁。