Using the Flexible Global Ocean-Atmosphere-Land System model （FGOALS） version g1.11, a group of seasonal hindcasting experiments were carried out. In order to investigate the potential predictability of sea surface temperature （SST）, singular value decomposition （SVD） analyses were applied to extract dominant coupled modes between observed and predicated SST from the hindcasting experiments in this study. The fields discussed are sea surface temperature anomalies over the tropical Pacific basin （20~0S-20~0N, 120~0E- 80~0W）, respectively starting in four seasons from 1982 to 2005. On the basis of SVD analysis, the simulated pattern was replaced with the corresponding observed pattern to reconstruct SST anomaly fields to improve the ability of the simulation. The predictive skill, anomaly correlation coefficients （ACC）, after systematic error correction using the first five modes was regarded as potential predictability. Results showed that： 1） the statistical postprocessing approach was effective for systematic error correction; 2） model error sources mainly arose from mode 2 extracted from the SVD analysis-that is, during the transition phase of ENSO, the model encountered the spring predictability barrier; and 3） potential predictability （upper limits of predictability） could be high over most of the tropical Pacific basin, including the tropical western Pacific and an extra 10-degrees region of the mid and eastern Pacific.
This study presents the spatial and temporal structures of the decadal variability of the Pacific from an extended control run of a coupled global climate model (GCM).The GCM used was version-g2.0 of the Flexible Global Ocean Atmosphere Land System (FGOALS-g2.0) developed at LASG/IAP.The GCM FGOALS-g2.0 re-produces similar spatial-temporal structures of sea surface temperature (SST) as observed in the Pacific decadal os-cillation (PDO) with a significant period of approximately 14 years.Correspondingly,the PDO signals were closely related to the decadal change both in the upper-ocean temperature anomalies and in the atmospheric circulation.The present results suggest that warm SST anomalies along the equator relax the trade winds,causing the SSTs to warm even more in the eastern equatorial Pacific,which is a positive feedback.Meanwhile,warm SST anomalies along the equator force characteristic off-equa-torial wind stress curl anomalies,inducing much more poleward transport of heat,which is a negative feedback.The upper-ocean meridional heat transport,which is asso-ciated with the PDO phase transition,links the equatorial to the off-equatorial Pacific Ocean,acting as a major mechanism responsible for the tropical Pacific decadal variations.Therefore,the positive and negative feedbacks working together eventually result in the decadal oscilla-tion in the Pacific.
