J Oceanogr (2013) 69:631646
DOI 10.1007/s10872-013-0194-4
SHORT CONTRIBUTION
Empirical method of diurnal correction for estimating sea surface
temperature at dawn and noon
Kohtaro Hosoda
Received: 25 November 2012 / Revised: 18 July 2013 / Accepted: 26 July 2013 / Published online: 29 August 2013
The Oceanographic Society of Japan and Springer Japan 2013
Abstract An empirical method has been developed for
estimation of sea surface temperature (SST) at dawn and
noon in local time from microwave observations at other
times of the day. By using solar radiation, microwave sea
surface wind, and SSTs, root-mean-square differences were
reduced to approximately 0.75 and 0.8 C for dawn and
noon, respectively. The pseudo SST variation and spatial
patterns found in daily mean SST values by simple aver-
aging of samples were damped down by use of diurnal
correction. The satellite SST with the diurnal correction
shows highly significant coherent variation with in-situ
measurements.
Keywords Sea surface temperature  Diurnal cycle 
Remote sensing  Gridded data  Sea surface wind 
Weekly-to-intraseasonal temporal variation
1 Introduction
Sea surface temperature (SST) fields determine the upper
and lower thermal boundary conditions of the ocean and
atmosphere, which means that SST is one of the funda-
mentally important variables in atmospheric and oceano-
graphic applications and research. SST fields can also
reveal the horizontal thermal structure in the ocean surface
layer and therefore enable monitoring of SST fronts asso-
ciated with oceanic currents and eddies (de Souza et al.
2006; Dong et al. 2011), and fishing grounds (Lan et al.
K. Hosoda (&)
Japan Center for Atmospheric and Oceanic Studies, Graduate
School of Science, Tohoku University, 6-3 Aramaki Aza Aoba,
Aoba, Sendai 980-8578, Japan
e-mail: hosoda@ocean.caos.tohoku.ac.jp
2012). Hosoda et al. (2012) showed that temporal scales of
SST fronts range from 10 to 40 days in most parts of the
global ocean. High-frequency measurements are therefore
essential in order to monitor and understand the variability
of SST fields. The oceanographic and atmospheric com-
munity requires SST gridded data sets with high spatial
(O (10 km) or less) and temporal (O (1 day) or diurnal
cycle-resolved) resolution (GHRSST-PP User Require-
ments Documents, 2009; Eyre et al. 2009).
Because satellite infrared radiometers cannot observe
the ocean surface under clouds, microwave measurement is
essential to produce the high-frequency data sets. Since
2002, the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer for
the Earth Observing System (AMSR-E) on EOS Aqua
(Local Time Ascending Node (LTAN) 1330 hours) and
Windsat on Coriolis (LTAN 1800 hours) have been used to
observe the global sea surface using the 6-GHz channel.
These systems are suitable for use in estimating SST,
including over low temperature ranges. Figure 1 shows the
SST data acquisition patterns by these microwave radi-
ometers. Because the swaths of the AMSR-E and Windsat
were approximately 1,400 and 1,000 km, respectively,
entire global coverage by each satellite path was not
achieved in one day. Figure 2 shows data availability of the
daily mean of the SST within a 0.25 grid box derived by
only AMSR-E and by a combination of AMSR-E and
Windsat. The data availability from AMSR-E only was low
in the mid and low-latitude areas. In addition, sun-glitter
reduced the availability of data in the Southern Hemi-
sphere. However, the combined use of AMSR-E and
Windsat provided data availability more than 85 % in the
mid and low latitude areas. The Intertropical Convergence
zones in the Pacific and Atlantic are major exceptional
areas, where scattering of microwaves by strong rain makes
it difficult to estimate SST. Therefore, it is expected that
123
632 K. Hosoda

Fig. 1 Example of daily 0 60 120 180 120 60 0 0 60 120 180 120 60 0

microwave SST acquisition
patterns for each satellite path 60 (a) AMSRE (c) Windsat 60
(September 27, 2009). a AMSR- 40 Asc. Asc 40
E ascending path (local time at 20 20 35
equator 1330 hours), b AMSR- 0 0 30
20 20
E descending path (local time at 25
40 40
equator 0130 hours), c Windsat
ascending path (local time at 60 60 20
equator 1800 hours), d Windsat 15
descending path (local time at 60 (b) AMSRE (d) Windsat 60 10
equator 0600 hours) Des. Des.
40 40 5
20 20
0
0 0
20 20
40 40
60 60

0 60 120 180 120 60 0 0 60 120 180 120 60 0

Fig. 2 Percentage data 0 30E 60E 90E 120E 150E 180 150W 120W 90W 60W 30W 0
coverage of daily mean SST
data by microwave radiometers 60N
(May, 2005). a AMSR-E only
daily mean SST. b Combined 40N
AMSR-E and Windsat daily
mean SST. Owing to AMSR-E (a)
20N
swath gaps and heavy rain
masks, data availability
produced by AMSR-E only was 0
less than 70 %. By combining
the use of two radiometers, data 20S
availability was over 80 % over
a wide area, except for the 40S
Intertropical Convergence Zone
60S

60N

40N

20N (b)

20S

40S

60S

0 30E 60E 90E 120E 150E 180 150W 120W 90W 60W 30W 0

50 60 70 80 90 100

the combined AMSR-E/Windsat SST can provide infor-
mation about the high-frequency SST variability in the
global oceans.
The diurnal cycle of SST, which is O (0.1 C) on aver-
age, is one of the most dominant signals in short-term SST
variability. Some studies have reported that it can be greater
than a few degrees in extreme cases (Kawai and Kawamura
2002; Ward 2006). However, there is not enough satellite
microwave observation to cover all global areas to give an
understanding of the diurnal cycle. Figure 3a shows the

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Empirical method of diurnal correction
simple average of available SST obtained from both the
AMSR-E and Windsat observations on one day (September
27, 2009). Hereafter, we use daily mean satellite SST to
denote the simple average. From A to B in Fig. 3a, pixels
with relatively higher SST gradient formed a line extending
northnorthwest to southsoutheast. At the western side of a
low SST core located at 30N, 145E, the SST gradient was
up to 3 C/100 km. This line with high SST gradient cor-
responded to the eastern edge of the AMSR-E afternoon
path, which means that the higher SST in the afternoon was
reflected only to the west of this line in the SST field. The
weekly-mean nighttime AMSR-E SST including this day
(Fig. 3b), which would not be affected by diurnal warming,
did not show such a extremely high SST gradients at the
western part of the low-SST belt. This low-SST belt was
generated by the transition of the Typhoon Choi-Wan
(Bond et al. 2011). This low SST belt was found in the
nighttime SST fields until at least end of September, 2009
(figure not shown). The SST gradient in Fig. 3a across the
typhoon track seems to be unrealistic. It is suggested that
this spatial structure was not naturally formed, but origi-
nated from satellite orbital pattern: afternoon SST data were
sometimes available and sometimes not.
All the simple daily mean satellite SST data obtained
from microwave sensors do not always correspond to the
exact daily mean SST field. The diurnal corrected SST field
(Fig. 3c) developed by this study, which will be described
in later, did not show the line structure of high SST
gradient.
In recent decades, SST fronts in mid-latitudes have been
focused upon, because the strong contrast of lower thermal
boundary condition across the fronts could cause system-
atic modification of the surface fluxes and marine boundary
36
(a) A (b)
34
32
30
28 B 28
26
135 140 145 150 135 140
24 25
Fig. 3 Example of daily SST fields with and without diurnal
correction on September 27, 2009. The dotted lines in the figures
are the eastern edge of the AMSR-E afternoon (ascending) path at the
day. Contour intervals for SST (gray lines) in these figures are 0.5 C.
a Daily mean SST obtained from AMSR-E and Windsat for
September 27, 2009. Both ascending and descending observations
of two radiometers were combined. b Weekly mean nighttime
633
layer structures. The study of airsea interaction on the
SST fronts and eddies has been reviewed by Chelton et al.
(2004), Xie (2004), and Small et al. (2008). Many of these
studies were based on the SST and SSW observations by
microwave radiometers. The pseudo SST gradient in the
daily mean SST, as shown in Fig. 3, may bring misun-
derstanding of the airsea interaction.
Three approaches can be used to produce daily interval
data for avoiding this diurnal problem of the satellite
microwave observations:
1. With a large temporal window, the short-term vari-
ability of SST is smoothed by a temporalspatial filter;
2. By use of a numerical model, the diurnal cycle of SST
is assimilated from a limited number of observations to
produce SST with a higher temporal interval; and
3. SST perturbation by its diurnal cycle is eliminated for
each satellite observation by use of an empirical
relationship, to produce a daily minimum SST and
amplitude of diurnal variability from a few
observations.
Some gridded SST products with daily interval adopted
approach (1). These products cannot reproduce the high-
frequency signals of SST temporal changes. Evaluation
requires a data-assimilation system, for example approach
(2). Independent observation should be used as the refer-
ence. Although it has been 10 years since Kawamura
(2002) and Guan and Kawamura (2004) expounded the
need to eliminate the diurnal cycle in the production of the
daily interval, gridded SST data set, this has not been
implemented in the most current operational SST data sets.
High-frequency sampling of SST is possible by use of
temperature measurements by moored buoys or visible/
36
(c)
34
32
30
26
145 150 135 140 145 150
26 27 28
AMSR-E SST composite for September 2228, 2009. The thick line
and black points denote the track and 6-hourly center points of
typhoon Choi-wan (2009) from September 18, 1800 hours (UTC) to
September 20, 0600 hours (UTC). The blue circle presents the storm
zones (SSW [*25 m/s) at each center point. c SSTDawn for
September 27, 2009, estimated by the method in this study
123
634
infrared radiometers on geostationary satellite; these can
provide SST data with time interval of 1 h or less (Ka-
wamura et al. 2010). The sparse distribution of buoys makes
it difficult to capture small-scale phenomena, for example
eddies, by buoy observation data only. On the other hand,
infrared SST data also have a problem of cloud contami-
nation, which lead to anomalously cold SST signals.
Although automated quality check methods for removing
these anomalously cold SST have been proposed (Hu et al.
2009; Hosoda 2011), Barnes et al. (2011) pointed out that
real cold SST events were also filtered out by such auto-
mated systems. Another approach used to check the quality
of infrared SST was proposed by Sakaida et al. (2009); in
this approach cloud-free microwave optimum interpolated
(OI) SST was used as a reference to reject the anomalously
cold infrared SSTs. To apply this method, reliable minimum
SST at the analyzed pixel in the calculation day should be
obtained from microwave measurements only.
In this decade, microwave and infrared SST data have
been applied to blended SST data sets with daily interval
and small spatial grid (B10 km) to meet the requirements
of NWP and oceanographic communities (Donlon et al.
2007). The OI technique has been widely used for pro-
ducing such daily mean blended SST data sets. The global
blend OISST products became available in recent years
(Kawai et al. 2006; Kurihara et al. 2006; Reynolds et al.
2007; Donlon et al. 2011). An intercomparison of the daily
interval, blended, or infrared SST products with a spatial
grid of approximately 925 km was given in Martin et al.
(2012). Remote Sensing Systems have released the daily
minimum SST data set with a spatial grid of 0.25 by using
an optimum interpolation technique based on microwave
satellite data (http://www.ssmi.com/sst/microwave_oi_sst_
browse.html). The diurnal correction method in their
product was given in Gentemann et al. (2003), in which
daily averaged solar radiation and wind speed data were
used for correction with the assumed function form of SST
diurnal cycle. The correlation scales used in OI processing
for producing these gridded products affect the main fea-
tures of the data sets produced. Some studies for calcu-
lating correlation scales for OI from SST data themselves
(Hosoda and Kawamura 2004b, 2005; Kurihara et al. 2006)
were based on the simple daily mean microwave or infra-
red data, which could be contaminated by diurnal warming,
as shown in Fig. 3a. It is possible that the extremely short-
term phenomena of diurnal warming could give a rise to
erroneous estimation of correlation scales for the daily
interval SST data set. Using the SST that is not affected by
diurnal warming during daytime (diurnal-corrected SST),
re-examination of appropriate obtaining correlation scales
for OISST processing has yet to be solved. For this pur-
pose, a diurnal-corrected SST data set without OI
smoothing is required.
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K. Hosoda
Elimination of the diurnal cycle from microwave SST
data sets is advantageous for consideration of long-term
SST variability without contamination of the diurnal cycle.
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has
proposed the Global Change Observation Mission
(GCOM)-Water (GCOM-W) satellite series. This has been
planned as three generations of satellite with a 5-year
design life and a 1-year operational overlap for on-orbit
calibration (Nakagawa 2010). The first GCOM-W1 with
AMSR2 was launched into same orbit as AMSR-E on May
18, 2012. As there is no local time difference between their
observations, the long daily mean SST time series pro-
duced by AMSR-E and its follow-on will not be affected
by the diurnal cycle of SST, which could contaminate in
SST time series as low or high SST signal by local
observation time difference between satellite orbital
designs. The three consecutive GCOM-W satellites and
AMSR-E will be effective in the monitoring and studying
of climate variability by using cloud-free SST data over
20 years by an identical measurement method at same local
observation time. Unfortunately however, the AMSR-E
operation terminated on October 4, 2011, because of a
problem with antenna rotation (url:http://www.jaxa.jp/
press/2011/10/20111004_amsr-e_e.html). There was,
therefore, gap of the SST time series at 0130 hours/
1330 hours during the period between the AMSR-E sus-
pension and the beginning of AMSR-2 operation. Although
the Windsat observations at 0600 hours/1800 hours were
available for this period, the daily mean without diurnal
correction would have introduced a negative bias in the
period in comparison with the remaining periods accom-
panied by the AMSR-series measurements. Elimination of
the diurnal cycle is required for long-term SST analysis.
It is expected that the daily minimum SST in the nighttime
or at dawn would be highly correlated with upper thermal and
density structures of the ocean, which are the target of fish-
eries or monitoring ocean currents and eddies. Therefore, the
daily minimum SST has been focused on producing daily
interval gridded data sets (Kawamura 2002; Guan and Ka-
wamura 2004; Donlon et al. 2007). It is highly possible that
the SST at local time dawn corresponds to the daily minimum
SST, because diurnal warming by solar radiation is increased
from that time. On the other hand, recent studies have sug-
gested that the diurnal cycle of SST could modulate the SST
variability on intraseasonal time scales (Shinoda and Hendon
1998; Barnie et al. 2005) to decadal time scales (Danabasoglu
et al. 2006) and improve the representation of the airsea
coupled modes, because of the MaddenJulian oscillation
(Woolnough et al. 2007; Barnie et al. 2008) or the El-Nino
Southern Oscillation (Danabasoglu et al. 2006). This suggests
that the difference between the highest and daily minimum
SST estimated from satellite remote sensing is also important
for atmosphereocean studies.
Empirical method of diurnal correction
The purpose of this study was development and evalu-
ation of an empirical method for resolving the diurnal
problem in daily interval SST data sets. The empirical
method is used for estimating daily minimum and daily
maximum SST from microwave and visible remote sensing
data, respectively. The former would be useful for moni-
toring and understanding the upper thermal structure in
ocean; the latter could contribute to airsea interaction
studies. The remainder of this paper is organized as fol-
lows: The section Data gives an outline of the data used used in this study to provide sources of the radiation fluxes: a
in this study; the section Diurnal cycle correction
method describes the diurnal correction methods for
AMSR-E and Windsat; the section Results shows the SeaWiFS global irradiance data set. This data set provides
analyzed results; and the section Summary and discus-
sion includes a summary and related discussion.
2 Data
This study uses SST data derived from two microwave
radiometers on sun-synchronous satellites: AMSR-E and
Windsat. In the development and validation of SST esti-
mation algorithms, either or both of the in situ buoy bulk
SST and NOAA OISST (Reynolds et al. 2002, 2007) were
regarded as true values. The NOAA OISST have been
produced from satellite observations with adjustment of the
produced SST fields to buoy SST measurements by sta-
tistical methods. Therefore, it seems reasonable that the
SST estimation algorithms from these microwave radiom-
eters should refer to the bulk SST estimates in their
observations. Because microwave emission is sensitive to
temperature at depths ranging from O (mm) to centimeters
(Fig. 6 of Hosoda 2010), it could be a debatable point
whether the data estimated by use of their algorithms could
reproduce the simultaneous buoy bulk SSTs (O (1 m))
sufficiently well. The comparison with buoy SST data will
be given in Table 4 in the section Results. solar radiation data before processing.
The AMSR-E was launched on May 4, 2002. Orbiting at
an altitude of 705 km, it has a local time at the ascending
node (equator crossing time: LTAN) of 1330 hours. The
orbital period of Aqua is 99 min. The 6.925 GHz band is
mainly used to retrieve SST from AMSR-E observations
(Shibata 2004, 2006, 2007). The instantaneous field of view
(IFOV) of the 6.925 GHz band was 43 km 9 75 km with a
sampling interval of 9 km 9 10 km. We used a version 6
AMSR-E Level 3 product, in which the spatial grid is
0.25 9 0.25. The SST data were quantized in 0.1 C steps.
Windsat was launched aboard the Coriolis satellite
mission of the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) on Jan-
uary 6, 2003, into an 840-km sun-synchronous orbit with
the LTAN at 1800 hours. The orbital period of Coriolis is
102 min. The 6.8 GHz band is mainly used for retrieving
SST (Meissner and Wentz 2006). The IFOV, sampling
635
interval and average incidence angle of the 6.8-GHz band
are 39 km 9 71 km, 12.5 km 9 12.5 km, and 53.8,
respectively. We used the Windsat version 7 Level-3
geophysical product, which provides 0.25 9 0.25 grid-
ded fields with SST quantization step of 0.15 C.
In this study we used the SST and sea surface wind (SSW)
data taken from the microwave observations. The solar
radiance data are required to eliminate the effect of diurnal
heating from the satellite-derived SST. Two data sets were
mainly used one is the JASMES (JAXA Satellite Monitoring
for Environmental Studies) JAXA/NASA MODIS and the
daily PAR (Photosynthetically Available Radiation) and
shortwave radiation maps estimated from the Sea-viewing
Wide Field-of-View Sensor (SeaWiFS) on OrbView-2
(local time of descending node (LTDN): noon), and the
Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS)
on both Terra (LTAN 2230 hours) and Aqua with a hori-
zontal resolution of 5 or 25 km (ftp://suzaku.eorc.jaxa.jp/
pub/GLI/glical/Global_25km/daily/readme_Global25km.txt).
By combining the MODISs and SeaWiFS data from JASMES
we prepared the daily mean solar radiation data with spatial
resolution of 0.25.
The International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project
(ISCCP) provides cloud information for global areas based
on the visible/infrared radiation measured by radiometers
on geostationary satellites and Advanced Very High Res-
olution Radiometer (AVHRR) aboard polar orbiting
NOAA satellites. Using the ISCCP cloud data, the radiative
flux profile data set (ISCCP-FD) provides the full-sky and
clear-sky, shortwave and long-wave, upwelling and down-
welling fluxes at five levels in the atmosphere (Zhang et al.
2004) at 3-h time steps with approximately 280-km inter-
vals. We used surface radiative fluxes from the ISCCP-FD
data set and from this data set prepared the daily mean
In this study, the daily mean solar radiation was used for
the diurnal correction method; this is described in the
section Diurnal cycle correction method. Figure 4 shows
the intercomparison of daily mean solar radiation data
obtained from JASMES and ISCCP-FD for oceans. The
comparison was conducted by using two data sets in the
global ocean from 2003 to 2009. The ISCCP-FD daily
mean solar radiation had a positive bias, especially in the
high solar radiation range ([250 W/m2), in which bias and
the root-mean-square-difference (RMSD) were larger than
6.24 and 23.7 W/m2, respectively. It is possible that this
difference between the two radiation data sets would be
because of the visible channels used in the estimations: the
AVHRR and radiometers on the geostationary satellites
used in ISCCP have a few channels in the visible wave-
length range whereas the MODISs and SeaWiFs have 9 and
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450
400
ISCCPFD Daily Mean SW (W/m 2 )
350
300
250
200
150
100
50
0
0 50 100 150 200 250
JASMES Daily Mean SW (W/m2 )
0 1000 2000 3000
Fig. 4 Frequency diagram between JASMES and ISCCP-FD daily
mean solar radiation data for oceans. The dashed line is a quadratic
regression between them
8 channels from approximately 410 to 880 nm for ocean
optical measurement. Murakami (personal communication)
suggested that the difference between the two sets of
radiation data presented in Fig. 4 could be related to the
shortwave (blue) radiation from ocean water which the
JASMES processing estimated.
The quadratic fitting for these two data sets is:
SWD;JASMES 6:88019 0:947077SWD;ISCCP
 3:34541  105 SW2D;ISCCP ;
where SWD;JASMES and SWD;ISCCP are the daily mean solar
radiation from JASMES and ISCCP-FD, respectively.
Using this regression equation, the bias and RMSD
between them in the high solar radiation range ([250 W/
m2) was reduced to -2.35 and 20.0 W/m2, respectively.
The adjustment of SWD;ISCCP to SWD;JASMES was intro-
duced in this study to avoid unrealistic changes in the
produced diurnal-corrected SST fields because of the var-
iation of the source of the radiation data. The changes of
solar radiation as a result of this calibration were not very
large, which means the two data sets are not significantly
different. However, calibration of multiple data sets would
be required if two or more data sets were used together for
diurnal correction schemes similar to this study. Because
its spatial resolution is comparable with that of the
microwave SST and SSW data, the JASMES MODIS/
SeaWiFs daily mean solar radiation data were used in
preference. When the JASMES data were not available
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K. Hosoda
because of operational problems or in areas of sun glitter of
these sensors, the ISCCP data cross-calibrated by use of
Eq. (1) were used for the diurnal correction.
We used bulk SSTs observed by drifting buoys at a
depth of 1 m of the uppermost ocean as the in-situ SST data
for matchups. The SST sensors in the buoys were calibrated
to an accuracy of 0.1 C before they were deployed in the
ocean (a description of the drifting buoy systems and oper-
ations is given in Global Drifter Programme Barometer
Drifter Design Reference published by the World Meteoro-
logical Organization/Intergovernmental Oceanographic
Commission Data Buoy Cooperation Panel (WMO/IOC
DBCP; Sybrandy et al. 2009). Surface marine data from the
buoys were gathered by the Global Telecommunications
System (GTS). The available data in the global oceans from
2003 to 2009 were used for regression (in the section
300 350 400 450 Diurnal cycle correction method) and validation (in the
section Results). A quality-control (QC) procedure for the
drifting buoy observations was required for rejection of
4000 5000 anomalous data. The basic framework of the QC procedure
in this study was the same as in Hosoda and Qin (2011).
To validate the temporal variation of corrected and
uncorrected SST at a fixed point, we performed a com-
parison with an in-situ SST time series obtained from the
Kuroshio Extension Observatory (KEO) buoy (Cronin
et al. 2008), deployed in the Kuroshio Extension recircu-
lation gyre at 32.4N, 144.6E. The resolution and accu-
racy of SST measured by the KEO buoy are
0.001 and 0.02 C (http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/keo/
sensors_keo.html). To evaluate temporal changes in SST
over a wide range of frequencies, an uninterrupted time
series of both in-situ and satellite measurements taken over
a sufficiently long period is required. Table 1 shows the
1 periods for which both KEO and AMSR-E/Windsat com-
posite data sets were available without interruption.
For evaluation of the results analyzed in this study, the
following data sets were used. SSW vector data with 12.5 km
spatial resolution were obtained from the SeaWinds scatter-
ometer aboard the QuikSCAT (Dunbar et al. 2006). For this
study, the Level 2B SeaWinds data were daily-averaged in a
0.25 box for each ascending/descending path. An atmo-
spheric re-analysis data set with relatively high spatio-tem-
poral resolution was compared with the satellite-derived SSW
Table 1 Periods of inter-comparison between the KEO and AMSR-
E/Windsat composite time series
From End
1 June 16, 2004 November 5, 2005
2 May 27, 2006 April 16, 2007
3 September 14, 2008 September 21, 2009
4 September 30, 2009 September 28, 2010
Empirical method of diurnal correction
in this study. The Modern-Era Retrospective-analysis for
Research and Applications (MERRA) is one of the latest re-
analyses of the atmosphere (Rienecker et al. 2011), produced
by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration
(NASA) Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) Global
Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO), using the God-
dard Earth Observing System (GEOS) Data Assimilation
System (DAS). The wind components at the models lowest
level from the surface turbulent flux (tavg1_2d_flx_Nx) data
collection was used. The surface turbulent data collection is
provided with a horizontal resolution of 1/2 latitude 9 2/3
longitude and 1-h temporal resolution.
3 Diurnal cycle correction method
In this study we focused on the SST values at dawn (at
approximately 05000700 hours: SSTDawn) and noon
(approximately 12001400 hours: SSTNoon). The matchup
databases (MUD) of collocated observations were made of:
the in-situ SST at local time 0600 hours 1 hour and
1300 1 hour, respectively;
microwave observation of SST and SSW at each sensor
local time; and
the mean solar radiation during the day (from JASMES
or ISCCP data sets).
The matchup conditions in this study had two criteria:
1. The distance between the in-situ, microwave and
JASMES measurements was less than 0.25; and
2. If JASMES data were not available at the grid, the
distance between the in-situ and ISCCP data was less
than 2.5.
We used data from MUD generated from 2003 to 2009.
One-third of the data of this MUD was randomly extracted
to derive coefficients for each sensor for the respective
objective time set and the validation was achieved by use
of the remaining two-thirds of the data.
Figure 5 shows a schematic view of the relationship of
the local time between satellite observations at each lon-
gitude. To estimate SSTDawn and SSTNoon satellite obser-
vations in the period of 12 h from each objective time
were used. The path of Windsat for the preceding day
(Day(-1)) at LT 1800 hours was also adopted to estimate
SSTDawn for the day being considered (Day(0)). For esti-
mation of SSTNoon, the satellite observations for same local
day (Day(0)) were used.
The generalized form of the regression equation is:
SSTDawn=Noon C0 C1 SSTSAT C2 lnSSWSAT because of the local observation time of the path close to the
C3 SW2D C4 SW2D lnSSWSAT ; 2 objective time. After diurnal correction on each path, the
where SSTSAT and SSWSAT are SST and SSW observed
by microwave radiometers at each measurement local time,
637
and SWD is the mean solar radiation of the day described
below. The original form of this regression equation was
proposed by Kawai and Kawamura (2002), in which the
diurnal warming amplitudes of SST at surface and 1 m
depths were estimated from daily-mean solar radiation and
wind speed. We checked whether the regression could be
improved by including other additional meteorological data
(e.g., total water vapor in the atmosphere, long wave
radiation flux), and found that the estimates were not very
different from the results obtained by use of Eq. (2). In
estimation of SSTNoon from the same days microwave
data, the daily-mean solar radiation in the day being
considered (Day(0): SWDay(0)) was used. For daytime and
evening measurements in the same day of the objective
local time dawn from AMSR-E and Windsat respectively,
the daily mean solar radiation of the day being considered
(SWDay(0)) was used for estimating SSTDawn on the day
(Day(0)). To estimate the residual diurnal warming effect
of the preceding days (Day(-1)) evening (Windsat
ascending) on the nighttime (AMSR-E descending) and
dawn (Windsat descending) of the day being considered
(Day(0)), the shortwave radiation during the preceding day
(SWDay(-1)) was used to estimate SSTDawn on the day
(Day(0)) (Fig. 5b).
The coefficients in Eq. (2), summarized in Tables 2 and
3, were obtained for each measurement time, and were set
separately for the two SSW regimes. The boundary
between these two regimes was selected as 3 ms-1,
determined empirically by trial-and-error. After diurnal
correction for each observation time, SSTDawn and SSTNoon
fields with daily intervals were obtained by a combination
of these diurnal corrected SST maps.
4 Results
Figure 6 shows the frequency diagrams of SST difference
between in-situ measurements at the objective times
(SSTDawn and SSTNoon) and the satellite SST with and
without diurnal correction. The differences of the Windsat
SST without correction show the zigzag distribution pat-
terns, which were partially because of the relatively coarse
SST quantization in the Windsat product (DSST 0:15 C).
The peak of each distribution without diurnal correction
was shifted to positive (negative) for in-situ SSTDawn
(SSTNoon) comparison, which was affected by the diurnal
cycle of SST. The exceptions were found on the ascending
path of Windsat (AMSR-E) for SSTDawn (SSTNoon),
center of the distributions were located around zero.
Table 4 summarizes the statistical results of AMSR-E
and Windsat measurements and gives estimates of SSTDawn
123
638 K. Hosoda

(a)

GMT Day(+1)
180 150W 120W 90W 60W 30W 0 30E 60E 90E 120E 150E 180

18:00 00:00 12:00 18:00

12:00 18:00 06:00 12:00

Loca
l Tim
06:00 12:00 e Da
y(0) 00:00 06:00
Loca

GMT Day(0)
l Tim
e No
00:00 06:00 on 18:00 00:00
Loca
l Tim
18:00 00:00 e Da 12:00 18:00
wn

12:00 18:00 06:00 12:00

GMT Day(1)
Loca
l Tim
06:00 12:00 e Da
y(1 00:00 06:00
)
00:00 06:00 18:00 00:00

18:00 00:00 12:00 18:00

180 150W 120W 90W 60W 30W 0 30E 60E 90E 120E 150E 180

(b) SWDay(0)
SST

SW
SWDay(1) AM Asc.

AM Des.
WS Asc.
WS Des.
WS Asc1.

12:00 18:00 00:00 06:00 12:00 18:00

Day(1) Day(0)

Fig. 5 Schematic diagrams of the diurnal correction system devel-
oped in this study. a Observation time of satellite SSTs and diurnal
correction scheme on a longitude/time plane. The local observation
times in this figure indicate the time at the equator. Those for mid and
high latitudes are shifted in range of approximately 25 min
depending on the satellite paths (Fig. 1). Horizontal and vertical axes
show longitude and local time (h) at each longitude. Red and yellow
areas indicate the time ranges of the day being considered (Day(0)) in
local time and GMT, respectively. Green/blue lines denote the
Windsat/AMSR-E observation times at the equator at each longitude
(broken lines descending; thick line ascending). The objective local
time ranges in this study (LT 0600 hours 1 hour and LT
1300 hours 1 hour) are indicated by gray areas. The white framed
satellite observations (observations LT 0600 hours 12 hours) and
the observations on same local day (Local Day 0) were used for
estimating SSTDawn and SSTNoon, respectively, in this study. b
Schematic view of local time relation of satellite observations (Blue
Windsat, Red AMSR-E) and the objective times (Green Dawn (LT
0500 hours0700 hours) and Noon (LT 1200 hours1400 hours)),
and hypothetical diurnal cycle of SST (red line) by solar radiation (sun
symbols). The deviations from satellite remote sensing data (except for
WS Asc-1) to SSTNoon were assumed to be correlated with solar
radiation in the day being considered (SW0). The deviations of
SSTDawn from previous (WS Asc-1., AM Des. and WS Des.) and
subsequent (AM Asc. and WS Asc.) observations were assumed to be
correlated with solar radiation in the previous (SW-1) and the day
being considered (SW0), respectively

and the SSTNoon from satellite remote sensing using the
correction methods developed in this study. In comparison
with simultaneous SST observation from buoys
(Table 4(e)), the bias for both sensors was smaller than
0.05 C and the RMSDs ranged from 0.75 to 0.90 C. This
means that the satellite SST products were able to repro-
duce the buoy SST measurements at their local observation
times with an accuracy of these RMSDs. Differences
between the satellite SST without diurnal correction and in-
situ SST at dawn (Table 4d) showed a clear diurnal cycle:
the AMSR-E ascending observation had a large positive
bias and RMSD in comparison with in-situ SSTDawn, and
the bias was small in nighttime observations (AMSR-E/
Windsat descending paths). In comparison with in-situ
SSTNoon, all biases of satellite SST without correction were
negative in the range -0.3 to -0.03 C. The RMSD
between satellite SSTs without correction and in-situ
SSTNoon were approximately 0.91.0 C. With diurnal
correction, the biases were almost negligible and the
RMSDs for SSTDawn and SSTNoon were approximately
0.75 C and 0.750.78 C, respectively. The correction in
this study reduced the estimation errors to comparable with
those for validation with reference to simultaneous in-situ
data. These statistics were obtained from MUD; more than
400,000 were obtained for each validation.
Figures 7 and 8 show the latitudinal distribution of
difference between satellite SSTs and in-situ SSTDawn and
SSTNoon. The biases and RMSDs were calculated from

123
Empirical method of diurnal correction 639

Table 2 Coefficients of the diurnal correction equation (Eq. 2) for difference coefficients were determined for weak (SSW B3 ms-1)
estimating SSTDawn from AMSR-E and Windsat paths. LT shows the and strong (SSW C3 ms-1) SSW conditions for each path. For
local time of each path, with day difference (-1D/1800 hours Windsat observation at dawn, solar radiation terms were not used for
means the 12 h before the focused dawn (LT 0600 hours)). The correction
Sensor Path (day lag/LT) SSW C0 C1 C2 C3 C4

AMSR-E Asc. (0D/1330 hours) Weak -7.154 9 10-1 9.798 9 10-1 6.426 9 10-1 -1.673 9 10-7 3.322 9 10-8
-1 -1 -1 -8
Strong -4.952 9 10 9.984 9 10 2.293 9 10 -5.968 9 10 4.350 9 10-9
Des. (0D/0130 hours) Weak -3.211 9 10-1 1.001 1.126 9 10-1 -2.503 9 10-9 -6.179 9 10-9
-1 -1 -2 -8
Strong -1.253 9 10 9.965 9 10 6.963 9 10 -1.006 9 10 1.021 9 10-9
-1 -1 -1 -7
Windsat Asc. (0D/1800 hours) Weak -1.126 9 10 9.964 9 10 1.817 9 10 -1.230 9 10 1.487 9 10-8
-1 -1 -8
Strong -2.990 9 10 1.001 1.633 9 10 -6.286 9 10 5.863 9 10-9
-3 -2 -8
Des. (0D/0600 hours) Weak 7.037 9 10 1.000 4.149 9 10 1.019 9 10 -7.621 9 10-9
-2 -2 -8
Strong 3.631 9 10 1.001 1.115 9 10 -1.522 9 10 1.891 9 10-9
Asc. (-1D/1800 hours) Weak 4.339 9 10-2 9.897 9 10-1 8.123 9 10-2 -1.072 9 10-7 2.025 9 10-8
-1 -1 -1 -8
Strong -2.104 9 10 9.973 9 10 1.324 9 10 -4.649 9 10 5.155 9 10-9

Table 3 Same as Table 2, but for estimating SSTNoon

Sensor Path (LT) SSW C0 C1 C2 C3 C4
-2 -1 -1 -8
AMSR-E Asc. (1330 hours) Weak 1.081 9 10 9.844 9 10 1.394 9 10 -2.300 9 10 1.361 9 10-8
Strong 3.251 9 10-2 9.973 9 10-1 6.461 9 10-2 1.211 9 10-8 -1.751 9 10-9
-2 -2 -7
Des. (0130 hours) Weak -8.742 9 10 1.004 1.078 9 10 1.243 9 10 -1.872 9 10-8
-2 -1 -3 -8
Strong 9.908 9 10 9.963 9 10 9.726 9 10 8.312 9 10 -7.321 9 10-9
-2 -2 -8
Windsat Asc. (1800 hours) Weak 9.128 9 10 1.002 6.059 9 10 2.739 9 10 -8.549 9 10-9
-2 -2 -8
Strong -3.381 9 10 1.002 8.004 9 10 1.200 9 10 -1.112 9 10-9
Des. (0600 hours) Weak 1.176 9 10-1 1.005 -2.256 9 10-2 1.537 9 10-7 -3.239 9 10-8
-1 -2 -8
Strong 2.174 9 10 1.001 -6.3727 9 10 7.477 9 10 -6.428 9 10-9

collocated matchup data in each 2.5 box. The biases of
uncorrected satellite SST were related to the diurnal cycle
of SST, which was large in tropics because of the strong
solar radiation. The positive bias for the SSTDawn was
prominent in the AMSR-E afternoon (ascending) path; the
Windsat morning (descending) path showed a large nega-
tive bias against the SSTNoon. By the diurnal correction
method in this study, these biases were reduced to be less
than 0.1 C in almost all latitudes. The RMSDs were also
reduced from 0.50.8 C to approximately 0.3 C, except
for in the Kuroshio Extension and the Gulf Stream, in
which the mesoscale disturbances are generated by their
instabilities. The spatial structures of these mesoscale dis-
turbances cannot be resolved sufficiently by the 6 GHz
channel footprint (O (70 km)) of microwave radiometers
(Hosoda et al. 2006). Meanwhile, the differences of esti-
mation accuracy between diurnal corrected SST data on
satellite paths became negligibly small. It is reasonable to
suppose that SSTDawn/SSTNoon can be estimated from the
microwave measurements at any local observation time by
using this method. For deriving the SSTDawn or the
SSTNoon time series, averages of all the available
observations in 12 h from the respective objective local
time were used in this study.
Figure 9 shows an example of diurnal corrected and
uncorrected SST fields and geophysical data used for the
diurnal correction. The daily mean SST field on July 25,
2007 (Fig. 9b) shows an elliptical warm SST signal at a
spatial scale of 200 km, which could be misidentified as a
warm-core eddy located at 37N, 145E. At the western
side of this warm SST signal, the SST gradients were
higher than 4 C/100 km, which was comparable with
those at the major SST fronts associated with the strong
currents, for example the Kuroshio Extension and the
Oyashio. It is worth noting that the high SST gradient line
corresponded to the western edge of an AMSR-E daytime
path, which was able to provide data of higher daytime
SST within its path area only. This warm SST signal was
not, however, found in the daily mean SST field in the
measurements from the preceding several days (Fig. 9a),
and the sea surface height did not show a corresponding
mesoscale structure (Fig. 9h). From measurements of
daytime SSW and the solar radiation fields (Fig. 9e, g), it is
suggested that this high SST signal coincided with a weak

123
640
80000
(a)
70000
60000
50000
Frequency
40000
30000
20000
10000
0 0
2.0 1.5 1.0 0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5
Satellite SST Buoy SSTDawn
Fig. 6 Histograms of SST differences between satellite observations
and the buoy measurement at the objective time for consideration
(SSTDawn (a) and SSTNoon (b)). The frequency was calculated in each
0.1 C SST difference box. The thick and broken lines denote the
SSW and strong solar radiation. Using the diurnal correc-
tion method using solar radiation, SST, and simultaneous
SSW in this study, the elliptical high SST signal was
eliminated from the SSTDawn field (Fig. 9c). Figure 9f
shows the diurnal change of the weak SSW areas from the
product of the MERRA. The re-analysis of weak SSW
areas at the time adjacent to observation time of the
AMSR-E ascending path (about LT 1330 hours) corre-
sponded well to those observed by the AMSR-E. From the
re-analysis product, the weak SSW areas gradually shifted
to southeast after LT 1330 hours, and those in the half day
after LT 1330 hours were found at a different location from
the afternoon. This diurnal change of weak SSW areas
within a day suggests that the SSW data at the different
observation times could not be applied for correction of the
diurnal warming for each satellite observation. The effects
on the diurnal correction by SSW diurnal change will be
discussed in the section Summary and discussion. In the
SSTNoon field (Fig. 9d), while the elliptical high SST signal
was located at almost the same location as in the simple
daily mean SST field, the sharp SST gradient at the western
side was not found. This suggests that the sharp SST gra-
dients at the western side of high SST signal, found in the
daily mean SST field, were produced by the AMSR-E
measurement pattern, not affected by geophysical forcing.
Figure 10 shows the short-term temporal changes of
satellite daily mean SST, averages of SSTDawn and SSTNoon
fields at the KEO mooring point. The in-situ daily mean
SST, SSTDawn, and SSTNoon obtained from the in-situ
observations of high-frequency sampling (10 min interval)
by the KEO buoy are also plotted. Within the satellite daily
123
K. Hosoda
80000
(b)
70000
60000
50000
Frequency
40000
30000
20000
10000
2.0 2.0 1.5 1.0 0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0
Satellite SST Buoy SSTNoon
satellite SST with and without diurnal corrections, respectively. The
total numbers of data are given in Table 4. Green: Windsat
Descending, Red Windsat Ascending, Blue AMSR-E Ascending,
Aqua Blue AMSR-E Descending
mean SST, relatively higher temperatures were found on
days in which the buoy temperature had a large diurnal
cycle. Although it can be suggested that the higher daily
mean SST reflects the strong diurnal warming on these
days, the daily highest temperature appearing in in-situ
SST were not always reproduced in the satellite daily mean
SST. From Fig. 10 it is found that the satellite daily mean
SST could have some large errors in comparison with in-
situ daily mean SST, when the diurnal cycle of in-situ SST
was large. If the high daytime SST observed by the AMSR-
E ascending path (LT 1330 hours) was not available on the
day being considered, the satellite daily mean SST could
not have produced the high-temperature event in the
product. It should be pointed out that the pseudo temporal
variation for short periods could be induced in simple daily
mean SST products obtained from satellites. The SSTDawn
time series from in-situ and satellite observations showed
similar temporal variability to each other. Whereas the
SSTNoon estimations were also capable of reproducing the
daily maximum SST values observed by the KEO buoy, the
estimation errors (e.g., August 27) were relatively large
compared with the differences between the in-situ and
satellite SSTDawn.
Morlet wavelet analysis was used to evaluate short-term
temporal variability in the satellite SST, in accordance with
previous studies (Hosoda and Kawamura 2004a; Kawai
et al. 2006). The advantage of wavelet analysis over the
traditional Fourier methods is that it enables localized
identification of the significant frequency components. The
wavelet coherence analysis between satellite and in-situ
time series indicates whether or not the temporal changes
Empirical method of diurnal correction 641

Table 4 Summary of microwave SST measurements validation for estimation of SSTDawn and SSTNoon
Prev. day obs. Same day obs.

(a) Sensor/path WD/Asc. AM/Des. WD/Des. AM/Asc. WD/Asc.

(b) Local time at Asc./Des. node 1800 hours 0130 hours 0600 hours 1330 hours 1800 hours
vs. in-situ SSTDawn
(c) Number of data 476,344 887,931 568,314 774,699 481,916
(d) Bias 0.09 0.07 0.00 0.25 0.09
RMSD w/o corr. 0.88 0.83 0.89 0.96 0.89
(e) Bias 0.00 -0.00 0.00 -0.01 -0.01
RMSD w corr. 0.77 0.73 0.77 0.75 0.76
vs. in-situ SSTNoon
(f) Number of data 976,158 636,750 847,690 530,708
(g) Bias -0.21 -0.27 -0.03 -0.17
RMSD w/o corr. 0.89 1.02 0.85 0.92
(h) Bias -0.02 -0.01 -0.01 -0.02
RMSD w corr. 0.75 0.78 0.77 0.76
vs. in-situ SSTSimul.
(i) Number of data 942,048 634,809 834,884 510,230
(j) Bias 0.01 0.00 0.04 -0.01
RMSD 0.75 0.89 0.76 0.75
WD: Windsat, AM: AMSR-E, Asc.: Ascending, Des.: Descending. (c, f): Number of match-up data, including both validation and tuning for
regression equation for SSTDawn and SSTNoon.(i): Number of match-up data for validating satellite SST with reference to simultaneous in-situ
measurements. (d) and (e):Bias and Root-Mean-Square Difference (RMSD) compared with dawn in-situ SST (SSTDawn) without and with diurnal
correction, respectively. (g) and (h): Same as (d) and (e), but for noon in-situ SST (SSTNoon). (j): Bias and RMSD compared with simultaneous
in-situ SST
Satellite SSTBuoy SSTNoon

0.50 0.50
Satellite SSTBuoy SSTDawn

(a) (a) Windsat Asc.

Windsat Des.
0.25 0.25 AMSRE Asc.
AMSRE Des.

0.00 0.00

Windsat Asc.
0.25 Windsat Asc. (prev. day) 0.25
Windsat Des.
AMSRE Asc.
AMSRE Des.

0.50 0.50
60 50 40 30 20 10 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 10 20 30 40 50 60
1.25 1.25
(b) (b)
1.00 1.00
RMSD

0.75
RMSD

0.75

0.50 0.50

0.25 0.25

0.00 0.00
60 50 40 30 20 10 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 10 20 30 40 50 60
Latitude Latitude

Fig. 7 Latitudinal distributions of bias (a) and RMSD (b) between Fig. 8 Latitudinal distributions of bias (a) and RMSD (b) between
satellite SST and in-situ SST at dawn (SSTDawn). Thick and dotted satellite SST and in-situ SST at noon (SSTNoon). Thick and dotted
lines denote the diurnal corrected and uncorrected data, respectively lines denote the diurnal corrected and uncorrected data, respectively

in the latter can be reproduced in the former. In this study, high-frequency in-situ daily-mean SST measurements at
it is expected that the daily mean satellite SST time series the point considered (green and orange lines in Fig. 10). In
at a specific grid should exactly reproduce that derived by addition, the time series of the daily-minimum satellite

123
642 K. Hosoda

140 145 150 155 140 145 150 155

40 40 15
(a) (e)

SSW(m/s)
38 38 10

<1.5m/s 5
36 36
0
140 145 150 155
40 40
21
(b) (f) 18
15

UTC(hr)
38 38 12
9
6
36 36 3
0
14 0 1 50
40 40 400
(c) (g)

Sol. Rad.(W/m2)
300
38 38
200

36 36 100
0
140 145 150 155
40 40 150
(d) (h)

SSH (mm)
38 38 100

50
36 36
0
140 145 150 155 140 145 150 155
18 20 22
SST(oC)

Fig. 9 Example demonstrating the capability of diurnal correction
using AMSR-E/Windsat daily composite SST maps. a, b Simple daily
mean SST fields for July 24 and 25, 2007, respectively. c, d SSTDawn
and SSTNoon estimated from AMSR-E and Windsat combination for
July 25, 2007, respectively. Contour interval for SST fields is 0.5 C.
The white dashed lines in b and d present the western edge of the
AMSR-E ascending path, which was able to provide observations of
higher temperature in the afternoon. e Sea surface wind observed by
AMSR-E ascending path on July 25, 2007. Contour shows weak SSW
area (wind speed \1.5 m/s) at the MERRA models lowest level, at
0300 hours UTC, July 25, 2007. f The diurnal change of weak SSW
areas from July 24 (broken lines) to 25 (thick lines), 2007. The color
contour indicates the weak SSW area at the models lowest level
(SSW \1.5 m/s) at each UTC time with 3-hourly interval, obtained
from the MERRA re-analysis hourly product. g Daily mean short-
wave radiation fields from JAXA/JASMES data set at July 25, 2007.
h Absolute sea surface height (SSH) from AVISO processed for July
25, 2007, using space-time suboptimum interpolation method with
latitudinal-dependent spatial and 15-day temporal decorrelation scales
(Le Traon et al. 2001)

SST or satellite SSTDawn should reproduce the corre-
sponding proper SST time series (daily minimum SST or
SSTDawn derived from in-situ data: blue and red lines in
Fig. 10).
Figure 11 depicts the percentage of significant coherent
variations between satellite and in-situ SST time series on
frequencyseasonal domains. The 5 % significance level
from a Monte Carlo simulation of 10,000 pairs was used to
determine the coherent variations (Torrence and Webster
1999; Grinsted et al. 2004). For the daily mean comparison
(Fig. 11a), the daily mean in-situ SST time series was
produced from an SST time series with 10 min intervals. In
general, the daily mean satellite SST had an 80 % signif-
icant coherence in the variation over a monthly time scale.
The percentage of coherent variation in the short period
(B30 days) was reduced to 70 %. However, the wavelet
coherent analysis between the satellite SSTDawn and in-situ
SSTDawn (Fig. 11b) showed a larger part ([90 %) of sig-
nificant coherency in a range of periods longer than 20
days. In shorter periods (B20 days), the percentage of
coherent variation was approximately 8090 %. However,
the ratio of significant coherency was not improved in
winter and some of the temporal change in SSTDawn
became less coherent in the shorter period (B10 days,
December to February) by diurnal correction of this study
5 Summary and discussion
An empirical method for estimating SST at objective local
times from satellite remote sensing data was developed and
evaluated in this study. By use of the empirical diurnal
correction method with solar radiation data obtained from
visible radiometers, microwave satellite observations at

123
Empirical method of diurnal correction 643

30.5 Temporal changes of in-situ and satellite SST were

compared by wavelet analysis. The coherence between
them indicates that the satellite SSTDawn, which is a com-
30.0 posite of diurnal corrected SST data, could reproduce
realistic SST variation over short-term periods. On the
other hand, it was suggested that the simple daily mean
29.5 satellite SST data would be contaminated by the diurnal
SST (oC)

cycle of SST even in longer (2030 days) periods.

29.0
28.5
28.0
20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
Aug., 2010
Fig. 10 SST time series at KEO buoy location. Black in-situ SST at
1 m depth with temporal resolution of 10 min. Orange in-situ daily
mean SST at 1 m depth calculated from 10 min interval record in
each day. Red and dark yellow in-situ SSTDawn and SSTNoon at 1 m
depth. Green Satellite daily mean SST from combined AMSR-E/
Windsat observations. Blue and dark purple satellite SSTDawn and
SSTNoon from combined AMSR-E/Windsat observations, respectively
any local time can be used to estimate SST at local time
dawn (0600 hours) and local time noon (1300 hours) with
an accuracy of 0.75 C and less than 0.80 C, respectively.
The large estimation errors were found at the western
boundary current areas, in which mesoscale SST distur-
bances were energetic. The sharp horizontal structures of
such disturbances could be resolved by use of infrared
radiometers.
The strategy of the empirical method for diurnal cor-
rection in this study was regulation of the remote sensing
data at shallow sea surface (O (1 mmcentimeters): sub-
skin SST) at its local time to the in-situ SST measurements
at 1 m depth (SST1 m) in objective local times. This
empirical method includes correction of diurnal cycle of
SST at each depth and thermal stratification within the
shallow surface layer. Using shipboard infrared radiometer
and profiling instrument, Donlon et al. (2002) discussed the
thermal stratification between skin depth (O (10 lm)
depth) and 5 m depth. They revealed that the difference
between them at nighttime is represented by
SSTdiff 0:14  0:30 expSSW=3:7. It is of interest
that the scale wind speed of 3.7 ms-1 in this relationship is
close to the boundary (3 ms-1) of two SSW regimes
(strong/weak) for diurnal correction defined in this study.
The separation from the correction values in this study to
the temperature difference between SSTs at subskin depth
and buoy measurement, which has been assumed as neg-
ligible at nighttime (Donlon et al. 2007), is also scientifi-
cally interesting. But it is out of scope of this paper to fully
explore this argument. Future study should be done to
resolve this issue.
In this study, the SSW data coincident with the SST
observation was used for diurnal correction. The previous
studies for diurnal correction methods (Kawai and

Fig. 11 Percentage of (a) (b)

significant coherent variation 100 10 100
0
between satellite and the KEO
buoy SSTs on the frequency
(vertical axis) and season 100
80

(horizontal axis). a Daily-mean

SST and b SSTDawn
Period (day)

comparisons, respectively.
Significance level 5 % using a 30 30
90
Monte Carlo simulation was
90

80
applied to the wavelet analysis
10
0

80
of each time series 80
90

10 10
80

80
8 8
01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12
Month Month

50 60 70 80 90 100

123
644 K. Hosoda

Latitude 20042009. While the diurnal variability values between

60 40 20 0 20 40 60 two distributions were systematically different, the latitu-
30
dinal distribution patterns between them were similar to
25 each other. In the following discussion, the SSW and its

5
diurnal variation derived from satellite SSW are used for
4
SSWNoon(m/s)

20
5 description. In the tropics, a relatively small wind vari-
3 3
ability (B2m/s) was observed in the weak and middle wind
15
regimes (B10 m/s). This means that calm conditions in
tropics would be persistent for at least one day. However,

diurnal SSW STDV (m/s)

10 2 4
the diurnal wind variability in the mid-latitude (4070 in
5 both hemispheres) was over 2.0 m/s even if the wind in the
2
3 afternoon was calm (B3 m/s). The extremely weak SSW
0
30 areas in the afternoon would be obscured in the daily mean
4

SSW fields by the large diurnal change of SSW in mid-

3 2
25 3 latitude, which would generate stronger wind conditions
4

(C5 m/s) at other local times. The obscured daily mean

SSWNoon(m/s)

20
wind fields could not suppress higher diurnal warming in
1
2

15
afternoon SST fields under calm wind to the SSTDawn by
the regression form. This suggests, therefore, that the wind
2

10 1 temporal change in one day would be a source of estima-

tion errors for the diurnal correction. Next, the effects of
5
these SSW diurnal changes are examined for diurnal SST
1

0
60 40 20 0 20 40
Latitude
Fig. 12 SSW daily variability as a function of latitude (horizontal
axis) and afternoon SSW (vertical axis) at LT 1300 hours
1400 hours. Upper panel The satellite SSW observations obtained
from the combination of AMSRE, SeaWinds and Windsat. The
calculation was conducted if number of the data from these sensors
were above three on the available AMSR-E afternoon SST grid.
Lower panel The atmospheric re-analysis data obtained from MERRA
1-hourly, 1/2 9 2/3. resolution data. These were calculated using
data from 2004 to 2009. Contour Intervals are 0.5 m/s (dashed line)
and 1.0 m/s (solid line)
Kawamura 2002; Gentemann et al. 2003) referred daily
mean SSW for correction. As shown in Fig. 9f, the diurnal
change of weak SSW area could cause the estimation error
in production of the SSTDawn and the SSTNoon. Figure 12
shows the latitudinal distributions of standard deviation of
the SSW within one day as a function of the afternoons
SSW (1300 hours1400 hours) from satellite observations
and atmospheric re-analysis data from the MERRA. The
vertical axis in the upper panel shows the SSW data
observed by AMSR-E on its ascending path (LT
1330 hours), and the collocated Windsat, QuikSCAT/Sea-
Winds and AMSR-E descending data from 2004 to 2009
were used for a calculation of diurnal variability. On the
other hand, the average of the models lowest wind speed
at LT 1300 hours and LT 1400 hours was used for plotting
vertical axis, and the diurnal variability of wind speed in
the lower panel was calculated from hourly-resolution
wind speed on ocean grids in the MERRA product in
2 correction using daily mean or simultaneous SSW data.
60 Figure 13 shows the latitudinal distributions of estima-
tion error variance ratio (r2 SSWsimul: =r2 SSWdaily )
between the regression using simultaneous SSW observa-
tion and SSW data for SSTDawn/SSTNoon from AMSR-E
daytime nighttime observations, respectively. The RMSD
values related with the former value (r2 SSWsimul: ) were
given in Figs. 7 and 8. The large discrepancy between
r2 SSWsimul: and r2 SSWdaily was found in the tropics and
mid-latitude areas. In the mid-latitude, the large changes
within diurnal cycle of SSW could cause estimation errors
by using daily mean SSW. It is expected that the diurnal
warming in afternoon (SSTNoon - SSTDawn) would be
strongly related to the SSW difference between these two
local times. The high temporal changes of the SSW in the
mid-latitudes suggest that the SSW values in other local
times even in the day being considered would be changed
from the observed values at noon and dawn. The SSW
change more than 2 m/s in low SSW areas in the mid-lati-
tude areas (Fig. 12) could cause errors in estimating diurnal
warming from remote sensing data. In the tropics, while the
SSW daily changes were not clearly found in the satellite
and re-analysis products (Fig. 12) the strong solar radiation
enhanced the estimation errors in diurnal corrections.
Many global and regional OISST products have been
released in this decade for ocean/atmosphere numerical
models and monitoring. Tohoku University had released
near-real-time OI SST data called as NGSST-O version 1.0
(New Generation SST for Open Ocean) from 2002 to 2011
in the area of the western North Pacific (Sakaida et al. 2009,

123
Empirical method of diurnal correction
1.25
Ratio of 2(SSWsimul./SSWdaily)
1.00
0.75
0.50
0.25
0.00
80 60 40 20 0 20
Latitude
Fig. 13 Latitudinal variability of SSTDawn and SSTNoon estimation
error variance ratio depending on the SSW data used in the regression.
The variance ratios (red and black lines) were calculated as estimation
errors using simultaneous SSW (SSWsimul.) and those using daily-
mean SSW (SSWdaily). The red (black) line and histogram correspond
to the variance ratio (r2 (SSWsimul))/(r2 (SSWdaily)) and number of
matchup data in each 5 latitude box for SSTDawn estimation from
AMSR-E afternoon (SSTNoon estimations from AMSR-E night)
observations. The condition for producing match-up database and
regression scheme for case using SSWdaily were same for those using
SSWsimul., described in the section Diurnal cycle correction
method. The data for comparison were obtained in 2006
1363N, 113163E). In near-real-time processing, the
simple daily mean SST fields were produced with daily and
0.05 intervals. Currently, many of the available OISST
products exclude the process of removing the diurnal SST
cycle in their data processing. We are now planning the
delayed mode reprocessing of SST in the NGSST-O area
from 2002 to 2011 with improvements in the data pro-
cessing. The diurnal correction for producing daily mini-
mum SST with amplitude of diurnal cycles will be
implemented for improvements. In addition, the correlation
scales for OI processing will be re-examined on the basis of
the diurnal corrected SST data derived by this study.
Acknowledgments This study was supported by the Center for
Atmosphere and Oceanic Studies (CAOS), Tohoku University. Two
anonymous reviewers and editor gave valuable advice which
improved this paper substantially. The ISCCP-FD data are coutesy of
the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies. The JASMES and
AMSR-E data were provided by the JAXA Earth Observation
Research Center. The Windsat data were distributed by Remote
Sensing Systems. The altimeter product in use was distributed by
AVISO with support from CNES. The Global Modeling and Assim-
ilation Office (GMAO) and the GES DISC distributed the MERRA
wind data. The KEO buoy was supported by the NOAA Ocean Cli-
mate Observations Program.
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