- AOAC International
AOAC International is a
not-for-profit scientific association headquartered inGaithersburg , Maryland, USA. It publishes standard analytical methods designed to increase confidence in results of chemical and microbiological analyses. Government agencies and other organizations frequently require that AOAC official methods be used by laboratories performing such testing for them.History
The AOAC, as the AOAC International is informally known, was originally founded
September 8 ,1884 as the "Association of Official Agricultural Chemists" by theUnited States Department of Agriculture , who wanted a set of uniform methods to be used for the chemical analysis of fertilizers. Consistent with its original name, the membership was in fact limited to government analytical chemists and remained so limited until 1987, when full membership was extended to industry scientists.The organization's name was changed in 1965 to the "Association of Official Analytical Chemists", to reflect a scope of interest beyond agricultural. In 1991, the name was changed again to its present name "AOAC International", which officially is no longer an
acronym , though the [http://www.aoac.org/about/aoac.htm AOAC website] encourages readers to interpret AOAC as an "Association of Analytical Communities".AOAC publications have centered around increasingly comprehensive sets of methods, including "AOAC Methods of Analysis" (1885, 49 pages), "Official and Provisional Methods of Analysis of the AOAC" (1912), and currently AOAC's main
periodical "Journal of the AOAC" (monthly), this last of which for several decades has been widely subscribed to by university and industry technical libraries as well as some AOAC members.Activities
AOAC International's technical contributions center on the creation,
validation , and global publication of reliable analytical test methods, primarily to evaluate the safety of foods, beverages, dietary supplements, and similar materials consumed by humans and animals, or to evaluate purity of materials used in production of foodstuffs and their ingredients. These test methods are of two broad categories: chemistry tests (e.g., for vitamins or pesticides) and microbiological tests (e.g., for spoilage agents or biological threat agents). Before a given method can be approved as an AOAC official method, it is generally tested in 8-10 laboratories, and the method text is made available to the membership for comment for one year.AOAC International has 10 North American sections, organized geographically, as well as 7 geographic sections in the rest of the world. AOAC International conducts one general meeting annually, typically in about September and typically in a major city of the United States.
External links
* [http://www.aoac.org AOAC International]
* [https://www.aoac.org/OMA/contents.html Official Methods of Analysis]
* [http://www.aoac.org/pubshop/11520.htm ISO 17025]
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