Gustavo Adolfo Morillo Díaz,Fernando Miralles Wilhem,Gerardo Aldana,Giovanny Royero,Alberto Trujillo,Eugen Wildermann, Centro de Investigación del Agua, Universidad del Zulia, Facultad de ingeniería, gmorillo@fing.luz.edu.ve
ABSTRACT
The Maracaibo’s Lake is a basin located in the western side of Venezuela and supports an important agricultural and industrial activity. This basin is a core of the petroleum industry since the 20th century. Oil activities had develop a ecological disorder, which a sign of primary manifestation were a cultural eutrophication process related to the phytoplankton blooms in the middles 70’s, and more recently, since 2004 an extensive covered area of Lemna obscura . It seems that change in the hydrological cycles and input of pollutants are the reasons of this macrophyte appearance. In this research, the spectral signature of Lemna obscura is evaluated using MODIS images from 2000 to 2010. Other program as ENVI 4.3 has been considerate to correlate hydrological data with Lemna obscura bloom. Spectral signature appearance of Lemna obscura could be a consequence and indicates changes in the hydrological and ecological features in Maracaibo´s Lake.
Key words: Maracaibo’s Lake, Lemna obscura, Spectral signature