Tecnologico de Monterrey, Escuela de Ingenieria y Ciencias, Av. General Ramon Corona 2514, Nuevo Mexico, CP, 45138, Zapopan, Jalisco, Mexico.
Centro de Investigación y Asistencia en Tecnología y Diseño del Estado de Jalisco, A. C. Normalistas 800. CP, 44270, Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico.
Environ Monit Assess. 2020 Apr 19;192(5):296. doi: 10.1007/s10661-020-08265-7.
A Water Quality Index (WQI) is a formulation that enables the estimation of the overall quality of a water body based on significant parameters. One example of this is the well-known and widely accepted NSF-WQI, which is frequently used to assess chemical, physical, and microbiologic features of waterbodies in temperate latitudes. In this work, a well-structured method, completely based on multivariate statistical methods and historical data distributions, was used to develop an ecosystem specific water quality index (ES-WQI). Lake Cajititlán, a subtropical Mexican lake located in Tlajomulco de Zúñiga, was selected as a case of study because it is an endorheic shallow lake that shows signs of high levels of eutrophication due to anthropogenic contamination. As a result of the contamination, and its sensibility to changes in the water level, it undergoes important changes in its water features, such as turbidity and intense green color, and experiences massive events of fish mortality. The proposed ES-WQI describes the changes in water quality over the year well and correlates with the capability of the lake to support aquatic life, as the lowest estimated values coincide with the biggest events of massive fish mortality in the lake. Furthermore, the ES-WQI clearly differentiates between typical cyclic behaviors and actual deteriorating trends and is capable of tracking incremental changes all over the range of the possible concentration values of the water quality parameters.
水质指数（WQI）是一种能够根据重要参数估算水体综合质量的方法。一个例子是著名且广泛接受的 NSF-WQI，它常用于评估温带地区水体的化学、物理和微生物特征。在这项工作中，使用了一种结构良好的方法，完全基于多元统计方法和历史数据分布，开发了一种特定于生态系统的水质指数（ES-WQI）。位于特拉萨尔坎的墨西哥亚热带湖泊卡希提坦湖被选为研究案例，因为它是一个内陆浅水湖，由于人为污染，显示出高度富营养化的迹象。由于污染以及对水位变化的敏感性，它的水质特征发生了重要变化，如浊度和强烈的绿色，并且经历了大规模的鱼类死亡事件。所提出的 ES-WQI 很好地描述了水质在一年中的变化，并与湖泊支持水生生物的能力相关联，因为最低估计值与湖泊中最大规模的鱼类死亡事件相吻合。此外，ES-WQI 清楚地区分了典型的周期性行为和实际恶化趋势，并能够跟踪整个水质参数可能浓度值范围内的增量变化。
