Sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies. SST of the ocean is indicated by measurements taken at depths that range from 1 millimeter to 20 meters. This measurement does not indicate absolute temperature at a location, but instead determines the number of positive temperature deviations (anomalies) that exceed the natural range of variation for a given location, i.e. the frequency with which a location experiences unnaturally warm temperature.

For more details on the variable construction, see the original sources:

AVHRR Pathfinder Version 5.0 SST data.

and

Casey, K. S., Brandon, T. B., Cornillon, P., and Evans, R. (2010). The past, present and future of the AVHRR Pathfinder SST Program, Oceanography from Space: Revisited, eds. V. Barale, J.F.R. Gower, and L. Alberotanza, Springer.

and

J. Afflerbach et al. (2015). (https://github.com/OHI-Science/ohiprep/tree/master/globalprep/Pressures_SST)

When using this variable, please cite both the OHI project and the original source.