Abstract

A climate data record of global sea surface temperature (SST) spanning 1981–2016 has been developed from 4 × 1012 satellite measurements of thermal infra-red radiance. The spatial area represented by pixel SST estimates is between 1 km2 and 45 km2. The mean density of good-quality observations is 13 km−2 yr−1. SST uncertainty is evaluated per datum, the median uncertainty for pixel SSTs being 0.18 K. Multi-annual observational stability relative to drifting buoy measurements is within 0.003 K yr−1 of zero with high confidence, despite maximal independence from in situ SSTs over the latter two decades of the record. Data are provided at native resolution, gridded at 0.05° latitude-longitude resolution (individual sensors), and aggregated and gap-filled on a daily 0.05° grid. Skin SSTs, depth-adjusted SSTs de-aliased with respect to the diurnal cycle, and SST anomalies are provided. Target applications of the dataset include: climate and ocean model evaluation; quantification of marine change and variability (including marine heatwaves); climate and ocean-atmosphere processes; and specific applications in ocean ecology, oceanography and geophysics.

Alternate abstract:

Measurement(s)temperature of waterTechnology Type(s)satellite imagingFactor Type(s)time • geographic locationSample Characteristic - EnvironmentseaSample Characteristic - LocationEarth (planet)

Machine-accessible metadata file describing the reported data: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.9939638

Details

Title
Satellite-based time-series of sea-surface temperature since 1981 for climate applications
Author
Merchant, Christopher J 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Embury, Owen 1 ; Bulgin, Claire E 1 ; Block, Thomas 2 ; Corlett, Gary K 3 ; Fiedler, Emma 4 ; Good, Simon A 4 ; Mittaz, Jonathan 5 ; Rayner, Nick A 4 ; Berry, David 6   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Eastwood, Steinar 7 ; Taylor, Michael 5   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Tsushima, Yoko 4 ; Waterfall, Alison 8 ; Wilson, Ruth 9 ; Donlon, Craig 10 

1  Department of Meteorology, University of Reading, Reading, UK; National Centre for Earth Observation, University of Reading, Reading, UK 
2  Brockmann Consult GmbH, Hamburg, Germany 
3  National Centre for Earth Observation, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK; EUMETSAT, Darmstadt, Germany 
4  Met Office, Exeter, UK 
5  Department of Meteorology, University of Reading, Reading, UK 
6  National Oceanography Centre Southampton, Southampton, UK 
7  MetNo, Oslo, Norway 
8  Centre for Environmental Data Analysis, Science and Technology Facilities Council Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Harwell, UK 
9  Space Connexions Ltd., Harpenden, UK 
10  European Space Agency, Noordwijk, Netherlands 
Pages
1-18
Publication year
2019
Publication date
Dec 2019
Publisher
Nature Publishing Group
e-ISSN
20524463
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-019-0236-x
ProQuest document ID
2309511759
Copyright
© 2019. This work is published under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.