Developing a hybrid algorithm to estimate the chlorophyll-a concentration from space

• Grant number: 18/20072-0
• Support type: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Effective date (Start): December 01, 2018
• Effective date (End): July 31, 2019
• Field of knowledge: Physical Sciences and Mathematics - Geosciences
• Principal researcher: Enner Herenio de Alcântara
• Grantee: Lilian de Paula Sousa
• Home Institution: Instituto de Ciência e Tecnologia (ICT). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de São José dos Campos. São José dos Campos , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Reservoirs are artificial aquatic ecosystems that modify the hydrodynamics of rivers. The increased retention time and, consequently, elevation of the nutrients availability time lead to eutrophication of the environment and blooms of algae (phytoplankton). Some species of phytoplankton may produce toxic metabolites for animals and humans. Therefore, the monitoring of water bodies has environmental and health importance for the management of water resources. The reservoirs have large areas that hamper the monitoring of water quality through traditional methods such as collection of punctual water samples. Thus, the use of remote sensing data can be useful to assess the quality of water in terms of active optically constituents, i.e., that interact with electromagnetic radiation. Remote sensing of water color aims retrieve the concentration of active optically constituents that modify the optical properties inherent in water, responsible for the change in color of the water. Due to the high optical variability found in Brazilian reservoirs the development of algorithms to deal with this variability still a challenge. Therefore, this project proposes the development of a multi-conditional algorithm, to increase the accuracy of such models.