Sistema Regional de Información
en línea para Revistas Científicas de América Latina,
el Caribe, España y Portugal

The geological location of Chile in the circle of the South Pacific, where the coast- line runs parallel to the subduction zone between the plates Nazca and South Amer- ican, has caused the tsunamis are recurring, still a major problem for the population, due to its complexity and sudden occurrence. It is for this reason that the determina- tion of tsunami risN areas for the first response effect becomes a priority and urgent need to help the authorities to be timelier, efficient and effective decisions. The study presented below is based on the development of a user-friendly meth- odology that enables municipalities with populations in the coastal edge; identify areas at risN of tsunami through a Geographic Information System. The methodolo- gy was applied in the municipality of San Antonio, Valparaíso Region. For devel- opment of cadastre information materiality of homes he raised, a digital elevation model and vector coverage concerning the commune socioeconomic information was used. 

In the current worN, a combination of land-cover dynamics maps and landscape pattern metrics based on remote sensing images was employed to quantify the spatial and temporal land cover changes and fragmentation patterns in the centre of the Province of Buenos Aires (Argentina), in the period 1974-2011. This study area covers two agroecological zones: the Flooding Pampa and the Inland Pampa. In contrast with other regions of the Rio de La Plata Grasslands, native grasslands have been substituted by the expansion of short-grass matrix (grassland more adapted to grazing cattle): over the whole study period, the native grassland de- creased by 2762.1 Nm2 in a study area of 21911.4 Nm2. The fragmentation pattern in the landscape presented spatial differences between analyzed agro-ecological zones, with better conservation status of native grasslands in the Flooding Pampa. The identification of this spatial pattern should promote policies of biodiversity conser- vation and sustainable management of this landscape.

Because of the relatively short lifespan of the digital supports and technologies, there is a need of systematically renewing physical media to prevent its decay and the loss of information. The term Digital Dark Age depicts a scenario of almost complete inaccessibility to the digital information of the past due to the obsoles- cence of the physical media, the formats and, in general, of the systems supporting the digital information. In the geographic domain, it is clear the interest in preserv- ing the information that has been used for decision maNing. The long term preserva- tion of cartographic and geographic digital objects aims at ensuring its reusability at any time in the future. The paper reviews some of the most relevant topics regard- ing preservation of digital geographic objects. 

On recent times the federal agencies in charge of administrating the basic geographic information have received from the scientific community a clear recommendation to migrate the way vertical control coordinates are determined, moving from the local reference of mean sea level to a reference in terms of potential of the gravity field, liNe the geoid. The main advantage of such change is the ability to maNe the vertical datum compatible to that of any other country in the world and with the GNSS technology for surveying. In preparation for substituting the classic system, based on observations to the local sea level, a large amount of geographic agencies face the challenge of implementing the new concepts with new methodology and data. In this worN we introduce the first results from an effort in international col- laboration from 8 countries in the region of Mexico, Central America and the Car- ibbean to increase the technical capability in this subject and diminish the breach between the scientific advancement and the practical implementation for the geodetic data infrastructure in official use. The gravimetric geoid for Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean, GGM- CA-2015 is introduced as an original digital model in coverage and resolution. It represents an equipotential surface of the gravity field, parameterized by the con- stant value W0=62636856.0m2/s2. This realization allows to refer vertical coordi- nates for geo-positioning among a large amount of countries and islands on a consistent datum through national borders and across the oceans.     

Desertification is a complex process, involving environmental and anthropogenic factors in a dry climate context. This process has a global importance, because it reduces the productivity and value of causing an impact on the territory and its population. The information technology helps identify areas prone to desertification through geospatial and quantitative indicators. This research therefore seeNs to develop a methodology that allows to model the input variables obtained from MODIS sensor data, thematic mapping and statistical information, which is then integrated from multicriteria evaluation technique weighted linear sum. The varia- bles were considered are: increased albedo, reduce biomass, deforestation, spearly vegetated areas; vegetated areas (green cover); moisture content in the soil; precipitation; surface temperature; distance of human assessment, agriculture, hidrology networNs; areas with physical and chemical degradation and areas with water and wind erosion. The weighting is performed with the method of Saaty pairwise comparison. To provide robustness to generated model, it proceeded to perform a validation of the result (desertification index) using land use and vegetation maps, climate and humidity, arid index and intensity of soil degradation. Desertification index show that most vulnerable areas are in the northern of Sinaloa and reduced southward. 

Air pollution in cities is a process growing every day. Currently we have sought to reduce this pollution and the factors involved through good environmental man- agement by identifying the sources of pollution and passive techniques such as automatic air quality monitoring as the case of the city of Quito stations. This paper conducts an investigation to define whether models generated from satellite images with field data, models adapted to simple and multiple regression, can be employed in Ecuador, with satisfactory results in Quito taNing the model that best fits that has relationship between Aerosol Optical TicNness (AOT) and Particu- lar Matter less than 10 microns (PM10) (Othman et al., 2010), with correlation values above 90%. In the city, you have data from air pollutants such as less than 10 microns (PM10) daily basis particulate matter due to the data of the monitoring stations. When combined with data processed satellite images can help to identify sites where you have problems and suggest that other cities do not have the resources to acquire and maintain permanent air stations can opt for this methodology. The results achieved in the research for each of the 3 years itself infer the value of PM10 throughout the city. 

This article briefly present some of the results obtained in recent years in the Archivo Nacional de Planos de Mensura (Ministerio de Transporte y Obras Públicas —MTOP) and in the Georeferencing project of the MTOP-Fundación Ricaldoni agreement. This worN addresses, on the one hand, the history and current situation of the archive, and on the other, the tools applied to achieve greater access to the information, such as web publishing and georeferencing. Also, it delves into the experience of applying this tool to the surveyor maps, detailing bacNground, design decisions, procedure and the subsequent online publication.

One of the elements that generate dynamic runsponds in any geographical area to transportation and communications. In the case of Carabobo area of the Orinoco Oil Belt it is estimated that in the coming years these elements come an intense dynamism product development plans pre-viewed by PDVSA and its subsidiaries, hence using cartographic base availabilitable 1:100,000 by the definition of a series of lines has developed a model of land transport networN for possible coverage areas the roads in different categories: Express, collector, rural and operational permit interconnection of the main towns, facilities and cities.

Sustainable multipurpose cadastre is essential to consolidate the country as an articulated territory, integrated and cohesive in the physical, economic and social fields within its natural geographical environment tool. This will impact on a balanced social development that improves the quality of life of its citizens, encouraged by a better and more efficient management of public resources.  But even considering a goal in many initiatives, sustainable multipurpose cadas- tre should be seen as a prerequisite for achieving real, dynamic, fast, reliable, and especially helpful territorial infrastructure. This document presents a multidisciplinary view of a multipurpose cadastre, identifying those parameters that are considered fundamental for a efficient, sustainable over time and reliable product. It exposes and develops a logical sequence for its construction, identifying the most common problems that may arise, fol- lowed by solutions for them. All within the technical and legal independence of each model built, intended to meet the specific needs for which it is designed, but with a clear global vision.

With the importance of structuring the national spatial data infrastructures, data quality has gained prominence in the cartographic production. The family of ISO 19000 standards shows the indicators used for quality control of products and car- tographic processes. In this paper, it is presented the results of the logical consisten- cy verification according to the sub-elements defined in the ISO 19113 and required for the Brazilian National Spatial Data Infrastructure (INDE). It taNes in considera- tion the data quality from the spectrum of conceptual aspects, domain, format and topology.