On the Correlation-Regression Analysis of Thermohaline Structure of the Northeastern Barents Sea Waters

A. P. Mirabel’, A. D. Shcherbinin, and I. G. Yushina

The results of the investigation of thermohaline structure of waters in the northeastern part of the Barents Sea are based on the data of the CTD-survey of hydrophysical testing area (for the regular grid with the resolution of 10 miles), as well as on the data of the stations of the northern part of meridional and quasi-zonal sections up to Novaya Zemlya carried out in August–September 1998 during the 14th cruise of the research vessel Akademik Sergei Vavilov of the Institute of Oceanology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The methodology includes the analysis of average T, S-characteristics and isopycnic, correlation-regression, and factor analyses of temperature field. The vertical profiles of thermohaline properties in the testing area enable to separate at least five typical elements within the general water stratification. The representative isopycnics for the cores of water masses and transition layers are determined from the averaged T, S-diagrams. The temperature and salinity at the isopycnic surfaces in these layers fit well the linear regression model with rather high level of statistical significance, that indicates a quasi-linear nature of the state equation. The areas of the highest correlations within the water column are separated using the factor analysis of temperature field.