A Tutorial Discussion of the use of the terms "Robust" and "Rugged" and the Associated Characteristics of "Robustness" and "Ruggedness" as used in Descriptions of Analytical Procedures

Duncan Thorburn Burns¹, Klaus Danzer² and Alan Townshend³

¹School of Chemistry,The Queen's University of Belfast, Belfast BT9 5EB, N. Ireland, UK
²Institute of Inorganic and Analytical Chemistry, Friedrich Schiller University of Jena, Lessingstrasse 8, Germany
³Department of Chemistry, The University of Hull, Hull, HU6 7RX, UK

Summary

The terms robust and rugged areclearlydefined and their uses distinguished along with the associated characteristics of robustness and ruggedness. It is shown that the characteristics of robustness and ruggedness which express resistance against conditions and influences which decrease both precision and accuracy of analytical results, obtained by a particular procedure in a given laboratory or in different laboratories, can be treated quantitatively by the introduction of two new concepts, namely, relative robustness and relative ruggedness.

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