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Variability of sea surface height in the South China Sea and its relationship to Pacific oscillations

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Abstract

The spatio-temporal variability modes of the sea surface height in the South China Sea (SCS-SSH) are obtained using the Cyclostationary Empirical Orthogonal Function (CSEOF) method, and their relationships to the Pacific basin scale oscillations are examined. The first CSEOF mode of the SCS-SSH is a strongly phase-locked annual cycle that is modulated by a slowly varying principal component (PC); the strength of this annual cycle becomes reduced during El Niño events (at largest by 30% off in 1997/98) and enhanced during La Niña events. The second mode is a low frequency oscillation nearly on decadal time scale, with its spatial structure exhibiting an obscure month-dependence; the corresponding PC is highly correlated with the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) index. Five independent oscillations in the Pacific are isolated by using the independent component (IC) analysis (ICA) method, and their effects on the SCS-SSH are examined. It is revealed that the pure ENSO mode (which resembles the east Pacific ENSO) has little effect on the low frequency variability of the SCS-SSH while the ENSO reddening mode (which resembles the central Pacific ENSO) has clear effect. As the ENSO reddening mode is an important constituent of the PDO, this explains why the PDO is more important than ENSO in modulating the low frequency variability of SCS-SSH. Meridional saddle like oscillation mode, the Kuroshio extension warming mode, and the equatorial cooling mode are also successfully detected by the ICA, but they have little effect on the low frequency variability of the SCS-SSH. Further analyses suggest the Pacific oscillations are probably influencing the variability of the SCS-SSH in ways that are different from that of the sea surface temperature (SST) in the SCS.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, 266100, China

    Yuhua Pei

  2. State Key Laboratory of Satellite Ocean Environment Dynamics, Second Institute of Oceanography, State Oceanic Administration, Hangzhou, 310012, China

    Yuhua Pei, Xiangming Zhang & Lianghong Jiang

  3. Key Laboratory of Ocean Circulation and Waves, Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Qingdao, 266071, China

    Rong-Hua Zhang & Yanzhou Wei

Authors
  1. Yuhua Pei
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  2. Rong-Hua Zhang
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  3. Xiangming Zhang
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  4. Lianghong Jiang
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  5. Yanzhou Wei
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Correspondence to Yuhua Pei.

Additional information

Foundation item: The National Natural Science Foundation of China under contract Nos 91128204, 41321004, 41475101 and 41421005; the National Basic Research Program (973 Program) of China under contract No. 2013CB430302; the Natural Science Foundation of China- Shandong Joint Fund for Marine Science Research Centers under contract No. U1406401; the Strategic Priority Project of Chinese Academy of Sciences under contract Nos XDA11010301 and XDA11010104.

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Pei, Y., Zhang, RH., Zhang, X. et al. Variability of sea surface height in the South China Sea and its relationship to Pacific oscillations. Acta Oceanol. Sin. 34, 80–92 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13131-015-0773-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13131-015-0773-x

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