The role of analytical chemistry in academic and industrial chemistry

Abstract

It is a largely undisputed fact that analytical chemistry - or at least analysis - is of the most fundamental importance not only to all branches of chemistry but also to all the biological sciences, to engineering, and, more recently, medicine, public health, the environment and the supply of energy in all forms. Scientists and technologists need not only to establish the identity of materials but also to quantify their composition and purity and to measure contamination at even tens of nanograms per gram. Even the most abstruse academic researcher needs to be able to analyse his starting materials or products and frequently to measure minute changes in chemical composition in order to be able to draw his conclusions. It is also a largely undisputed and rather curious fact that the United Kingdom, which pioneered the industrial revolution, has largely neglected the academic discipline of analytical chemistry and, even in industry, its position has been downgraded relative to the other main branches of chemistry. During the nineteenth century, academic analytical chemistry was not as widely established in Britain as elsewhere in the world. Furthermore, it suffered such a series of setbacks that by the beginning of the twentieth century it scarcely ranked as an academic discipline of chemistry. Some of the reasons for this astonishing state of affairs are reviewed and the present situation is assessed following the revival that occurred in the middle decades in a few of the universities of the U.K.