Abstract
SeaWiFS measurements of Chlorophyll-a (Chl-a) and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) are analyzed for understanding the coupling between the oceanic and terrestrial biospheres at interannual timescale. Principal component analysis (PCA) of NDVI and Chl-a jointly suggests existence of stationary/dipole modes of variability between several neighbouring land-ocean regions. PC time series for NDVI and Chl-a separately are found to be anticorrelated during the period of this analysis (Autumn 1997-Summer 2006). Other satellite and analyzed products, e.g., sea-surface temperature, precipitation, absorbing aerosols suggest that the observed land-ocean biospheres are coupled beyond that can be explained by purely dynamical mechanisms.
