'The dominant spatial patterns of Barents Sea ice variance'

Barents Sea ice growth is a good indicator of overall climate change from year to year, with a general trend toward less growth. Inflow of Atlantic water is known to have a general dependence on the effect of Barents sea ice cover. However, recent studies have been concerned with putting one areal number of change without further assessing the associated dominant spatial patterns of variance. A further detailed assessment is necessary for more practical and informative predictions. In order to examine the dominant patterns of sea ice variability and their temporal variations, we apply the empirical orthogonal function analysis on the observed sea ice concentration. The analysis reveals one dominant pattern of sea-ice variance associated with the net-change, highly correlated with the Atlantic inflow and the ice import and explains the 40% of the total variability, and one other pattern that characterizes redistribution of the sea ice within the area associated with the local winds impact over the basin, which explains the 20% of the total variability.