# Orca: Ocean Significant Wave Height Estimation with Spatio-temporally Aware Large Language Models

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2407.20053 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.20053/

## Key facts

- Cited by 6 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 14 of its 37 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 29 Jul 2024.

## Builds on (most cited first, 14 of 14)

- [Chain-of-Thought Prompting Elicits Reasoning in Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2201.11903/) (2022)
- [Large Language Models are Zero-Shot Reasoners](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2205.11916/) (2022)
- [A Time Series is Worth 64 Words: Long-term Forecasting with Transformers](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2211.14730/) (2022)
- [Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.05782/) (2023)
- [GPT Understands, Too](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.10385/) (2021)
- [One Fits All:Power General Time Series Analysis by Pretrained LM](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.11939/) (2023)
- [TFB: Towards Comprehensive and Fair Benchmarking of Time Series Forecasting Methods](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.20150/) (2024)
- [Pathformer: Multi-scale Transformers with Adaptive Pathways for Time Series Forecasting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2402.05956/) (2024)
- [LightTS: Lightweight Time Series Classification with Adaptive Ensemble Distillation -- Extended Version](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.12721/) (2023)
- [A Unified Replay-based Continuous Learning Framework for Spatio-Temporal Prediction on Streaming Data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2404.14999/) (2024)
- [Unsupervised Time Series Outlier Detection with Diversity-Driven Convolutional Ensembles -- Extended Version](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2111.11108/) (2021)
- [Graph Attention Recurrent Neural Networks for Correlated Time Series Forecasting -- Full version](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.10760/) (2021)
- [Joint Neural Architecture and Hyperparameter Search for Correlated Time Series Forecasting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2211.16126/) (2022)
- [Robust and Explainable Autoencoders for Unsupervised Time Series Outlier Detection---Extended Version](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.03341/) (2022)

## Built on by (most cited first, 6 of 6)

- [Foundation Models for Spatio-Temporal Data Science: A Tutorial and Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.13502/) (2025)
- [A Survey of Large Language Model-Powered Spatial Intelligence Across Scales: Advances in Embodied Agents, Smart Cities, and Earth Science](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.09848/) (2025)
- [Unraveling Spatio-Temporal Foundation Models via the Pipeline Lens: A Comprehensive Review](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.01364/) (2025)
- [ARROW: An Adaptive Rollout and Routing Method for Global Weather Forecasting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.09734/) (2025)
- [Data Driven Decision Making with Time Series and Spatio-temporal Data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.08473/) (2025)
- [TiWeaver: Unified Temporal Dynamics Modeling via Contextual Patching](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.03121/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Significant wave height (SWH) is a vital metric in marine science, and accurate SWH estimation is crucial for various applications, e.g., marine energy development, fishery, early warning systems for potential risks, etc. Traditional SWH estimation methods that are based on numerical models and physical theories are hindered by computational inefficiencies. Recently, machine learning has emerged as an appealing alternative to improve accuracy and reduce computational time. However, due to limited observational technology and high costs, the scarcity of real-world data restricts the potential of machine learning models. To overcome these limitations, we propose an ocean SWH estimation framework, namely Orca. Specifically, Orca enhances the limited spatio-temporal reasoning abilities of classic LLMs with a novel spatiotemporal aware encoding module. By segmenting the limited buoy observational data temporally, encoding the buoys' locations spatially, and designing prompt templates, Orca capitalizes on the robust generalization ability of LLMs to estimate significant wave height effectively with limited data. Experimental results on the Gulf of Mexico demonstrate that Orca achieves state-of-the-art performance in SWH estimation.