0)install netcdf-3.6.1 1) use NCO (netcdf operator) to extract from the WOA to your local region and save into separate netcdf file 2) use matlab + mexnc+netcdf_toolbox to read into matlab you can find mexnc and netcdf_toolbox on sourceforge. How to use netcdf_toolbox (on linux/unix) matlab -nojvm > f=netcdf('filename.nc'); > > variablename=f{'variable'}(:); > >whos > where variable is a variable name in the netcdf file. Use ncdump -h filename.nc to find out what is