US warming study

The continental United States will face more extreme temperatures during the next century and worse rainfall along its Gulf Coast which has been ravaged by hurricanes this year, according to a climate study released.

The study, published on the online edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, warned that greenhouse gases will likely swell to twice their current levels by the century's end.

"Imagine the weather during the hottest two weeks of the year," lead researcher Noah Diffenbaugh said, referring to northeast United States.

"The area could experience temperatures in that range lasting for periods of up to two months by century's end," he said.

Researchers claimed the study, run on supercomputers at Purdue University in Indiana state, is the most comprehensive climate model to date.

It predicts the southwest United States could endure as much as a 500 percent increase in hot events, leaving less water for the growing population, that the Gulf Coast region would receive more rainfall in shorter time spans and that summers in the northeast would be shorter and hotter.