The principal investigator is one of the pioneers of the development and applications of factor analysis to problems in chemistry. He is coauthor of the first research text devoted to this chemometric methodology and is fully qualified to carry out the proposed research. In spite of their popular use, spectroscopic methods for studying complex compounds in solution have not been developed sufficiently to match the degree of advancement of the instrumentation available. This proposal concerns the development of """"""""evolutionary factor analysis"""""""" (EFA), a powerful computer technique based on statistics and linear algebra, for the following purposes: (1) determination of the number of absorbing complexes in a solution, (2) determination of the controlling equilibria, (3) isolation of the spectra of each complex species. The method will be applied to the ultraviolet-visible spectra of cationic complexes of ammonia and polyamines, to the infrared spectra of alcohols and the circular dichroism spectra of Cu (II) and Co (II) complexs of L-threonine. The EFA methodology affords a new way of spectroscopic analysis of multicomponent systems of importance to chemistry, biology and medicine. Many analytical problems that cannot be solved by the classical techniques today may be solvable by EFA. The methodology should also be applicable to other areas that involve evolutionary processes, such as chromatography, reaction kinetics, enzyme catalysis and transport across membranes.
