A comparative visualization tool for ocean data analysis based on mode water regions

Ocean data have been improved with the enhancement of observed values and the evolution of computational technologies. It has also been verified based on the reproducibility of various ocean phenomena. Mode water is one of the indicators for assessing ocean data because of its special properties. However, its definition differs for each ocean data. Besides, its observation is primarily performed by 2D analysis using the cutting plane of the ocean space. Therefore, reproducibility of the ocean space may have not been fully examined. Here, this paper presents a visual analysis tool for the feature of ocean data based on the 3D shape comparison of the mode water regions among three ocean datasets. Our comparison is based on similarity measure from shape appearances of the mode water regions extracted as isosurfaces. Users can interact with shape similarity data and a pair of isosurfaces. Our visualization tool supports to easily explore the relationship of different variable thresholds that are used for conditions of the mode water region and observe the specified parts of the pair in the 3D space. We demonstrate the availability and potential benefit of this approach through three examples that searched for the best conditions and expert feedback. Graphic abstract