Ocean color of Mayaguez Bay has been part of the research efforts made by the GERS Lab since its foundation. In most recent years the work has focused on testing and validating the MODIS sensor. The results of such work were presented during this year NOAA-CREST Symposium that was held in the University of Puerto Rico at Mayaguez on February 21, 2008. The presentation given by Fernando Gilbes was titled “MODIS Validation for Water Quality Parameters in Mayagüez Bay” and presented image processing and analyses that clearly demonstrated how MODIS is not the most appropriate ocean color sensor for Mayagüez Bay. Another sensor with better temporal, spatial, and spectral resolutions is still needed for the estimation of Chl-a and suspended sediments in tropical coastal waters. The work also suggests that future work with MODIS in this region must improve the atmospheric correction, consider other sources of error like bottom and land signal, and removes contamination by CDOM. Other authors of this work were William Hernandez, Vilmaliz Rodriguez, Jose Martinez and Natlee Hernandez.
