Importance of Measurements

Measurements must be considered in the broadest sense and have very diverse applications:

• toxic metals in drinking water;
• cholesterol level in blood;
• strength of construction materials;
• protein content in wheat;
• octane number of gasoline

Important decisions (economical, social, medical) are based on results of measurements. Just a couple of examples of the huge importance of measurements:

• 40% of the EU directives involve measurements;
• It has been estimated that direct spendings on measurements alone make up ca 80 billions of EUR or 1% of the GDP in Europe

A very significant part of all measurements are chemical measurements (chemical analyses).

Yet, in spite of their importance, all too often measurement results are of unsatisfactory quality (i.e. are wrong). The following interlaboratory comparison graph illustrates this:

Results from the IMEP-21 Intercomparison

Around half of the results in this intercomparison round are unsatisfactory! (Please see the IMEP website for more information.)

Insufficient education of lab workers and their superiors is the main reason for this situation. The mission of the Measurement Science in Chemistry consortium is to contribute to radical improvement of the education level in this field by being the best international provider of measurement science education in chemistry.