The theory is encapsulated in the paper Sun, D.-Z. and Z. Liu, 1996 : Dynamic ocean-atmosphere coupling: a thermostat for the tropics. Science, 272, 1148-1150.
Sun and Liu (1996) formulated the regulation of tropical maximum SST in terms of the emergent behavior of a nonlinear, coupled ocean–atmosphere system.
A central prediction of this theory is that an increase in radiative heating intensity enhances the zonal SST contrast, thereby strengthening the zonal winds and the associated ocean currents, which act to counteract the warming effect of increased radiative heating
At about the same time, using a different model, Clement et al. (1996) also found that increased radiative heating leads to an enhanced zonal SST contrast and identified the associated coupled feedback as a ocean dynamical thermostat.
Sun and Liu (1996) also demonstrated that dynamical oceanic feedback depends on cloud-related feedbacks owing to the nonlinear dynamics of the coupled tropical ocean–atmosphere system, highlighting the limitations of linear feedback frameworks for understanding the climate system’s sensitivity to radiative forcing.