William Horwitz

William Horwitz (-September 27, 2006 Olney, Maryland) was an analytical chemist who is notable for formulating a description of the relationship between the variability of chemical measurements and the concentration of the analyte [Horwitz, W. "Anal. Chem." 1982, "54", 67A.] . This relationship, called the Horwitz curve applies only to the between-laboratory variability of measurements.

Horowitz worked for the FDA for 57 years until his retirement in 2000 and was head of the Association of Official Analytical Chemists for 24 years.

The Horwitz curve is "one of the most intriguing relationships in modern analtyical chemistry" [Happ, P., Selinger, B. "Anal. Chem". 1989, "61", 1465.] ; it is related to the Variance-to-mean ratio.

References

* [http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb5601/is_200701/ai_n23589646 Obituaries: William Horwitz]
* [http://www.rsc.org/images/brief17_tcm18-25961.pdf The amazing Horwitz function]
* [http://old.iupac.org/publications/ci/2000/november/awards_horwitz.html William Horwitz Receives Robert Boyle Medal from Royal Society of Chemistry] Chemistry International Vol. 22, No. 6 November 2000