Aims

To provide students with a fundamental understanding of the basic statistical techniques (summary statistics, probability distributions, interval estimation and regression analysis) routinely used in the chemical and process industries.

This module addresses a real area of practical applicability in the process and manufacturing industries. One area that has become increasingly important is that of statistics. This course provides the basis for all subsequent statistical modules by introducing the fundamental statistical tools to undertake a preliminary statistical analysis of any data. More specifically the course introduces basic statistical tools that enable data to be presented, described and interpreted in an appropriate and statistically robust manner.

Outline Of Syllabus

Introduction: Descriptive statistics;
Probability; Continuous distributions, normal distribution;
Statistical Inference; Sampling distributions and confidence intervals – One sample problems (mean, standard deviation, paired comparisons) and Two sample problems (comparison of means, ratio of variances); Regression analysis.

Teaching Rationale And Relationship

Lectures convey the statistical concepts and theory and their application in process engineering. Practical classes support the learning introduced in lectures through the students having the opportunity to apply the concepts to a number of problems varying in terms of complexity. The practical classes allow the completion of work in preparation for assessment.

Assessment Rationale And Relationship

The examination enables the assessment of whether the students have understood the methodologies and whether they are sufficiently conversant with the application of the techniques to real world scenarios.