Water quality monitoring in Taihu Lake using MODIS image data

Remote sensing technique has been widely applied in water quality monitoring, since it can provide both spatial and temporal information needed to detect the changes of water quality. However, inland water monitoring using remote sensing technique is still experimental, and its development depends on improved remote sensors with higher spectral and spatial resolution. The purpose of this paper is to apply MODIS image data to inland lake water quality monitoring, and then to provide a MODIS-based procedure for regional inland water quality monitoring. After the correlation analysis between band combinations and water parameters such as chlorophyll-a and suspended sediment, we proposed an empirical algorithm based on certain MODIS bands. The study showed that MODIS image data were useful for water quality monitoring in Taihu Lake.