Spatial and temporal variability of SST in the Zhejiang Coastal Waters during 2003-2013

摘要

The spatial and temporal variability of sea surface temperature (SST) in the Zhejiang Coastal Waters of the East China Sea is investigated with long time series of cloud-gap free SST imagery. The SST dataset is reconstructed with Data INterpolating Empirical Orthogonal Function (DINEOF) method using daily MODIS Aqua SST images. An EOF analysis technique is further used to reveal the regional temporal and spatial SST variability at seasonal to inter-annual timescales. The first three EOF modes cumulatively account for more than 84% of the total SST variance. The first mode explains 71.5% of the total SST variability and it is dominated by an annual cycle. The second mode accounts for 10.3% of the SST variance and it reveals a warm/cold pattern in the coastal shelf sea. The third mode, accounting for 2.4% of the SST variance, indicates a pattern describing the synoptic-scale variability.