Matérn Cross-Covariance Functions for Multivariate Random Fields

Abstract

We introduce a flexible parametric family of matrix-valued covariance functions for multivariate spatial random fields, where each constituent component is a Matérn process. The model parameters are interpretable in terms of process variance, smoothness, correlation length, and colocated correlation coefficients, which can be positive or negative. Both the marginal and the cross-covariance functions are of the Matérn type. In a data example on error fields for numerical predictions of surface pressure and temperature over the North American Pacific Northwest, we compare the bivariate Matérn model to the traditional linear model of coregionalization.