Meeting reports: International conference on chemometrics in analytical chemistry

In the field of analytical chemistry, chemometrics has been defined as 'the chemical discipline which uses mathematical and statistical methods to achieve the aim of analytical chemistry, namely the obtention, in the optimal way, of relevant information about material systems'. There has been a tremendous growth of interest in the role of chemometrics in analytical chemistry in recent years and this has been reflected in the number of symposia devoted to the subject. Two meetings, held in Europe in September 1982, covered different aspects of chemometrics and some of the more significant points discussed are summarized in the reports below.