High Dimensional Dataset Compression Using Principal Components

Until recently, computational power was insufficient to diagonalize atmospheric datasets of order 10 10 elements. Eigenanalysis of tens of thousands of variables now can achieve massive data compression for spatial fields with strong correlation properties. Application of eigenanalysis to 26,394 variable dimensions, for three severe weather datasets (tornado, hail and wind) retains 9 11 principal components explaining 42% 52% of the variability. Rotated principal components (RPCs) detect localized coherent data variance structures for each outbreak type and are related to standardized anomalies of the meteorological fields. Our analyses of the RPC loadings and scores show that these graphical displays can efficiently reduce and interpret large datasets. Data is analyzed 24 hours prior to severe weather as a forecasting aid. RPC loadings of sea-level pressure fields show different morphology loadings for each outbreak type. Analysis of low level moisture and temperature RPCs suggests moisture fields for hail and wind which are more related than for tornado outbreaks. Consequently, these patterns can identify precursors of severe weather and discriminate between tornadic and non-tornadic outbreaks.