About our mission

Analytical science plays a crucial role in economic and societal dynamics in the Netherlands.

Positioned between fundamental sciences and final application, analytical science is at the heart of innovation. By uniting technology and application under a shared focus, innovation in analytical science will greatly benefit the topsectors and the societal challenges or mission themes as defined by the Dutch government.

Analytical science:

  • Enables system understanding through measurement of a variety of factors
  • Generates insight in structure-property relationships for materials and biological entities
  • Facilitates real-time in-situ measurement

The COAST community invests in innovation and education of analytical science. Participation in COAST allows you to leverage your analytical capabilities, both technologically and in terms of human capital. Thus, COAST helps to solve important societal challenges, such as security, (waste) water management, food safety, health, energy transition and circularity by providing fit-for-purpose measurement technologies.

In more detail

Improvements in the chemical, spatial and temporal resolution of analytical instruments, combined with miniaturization
of those instruments and advanced data processing, will make analytical science even more socially and economically
relevant.

Thus, analytical science and technology:

  • Provides the technological basis for innovations in existing application areas;
  • Helps to address important societal challenges, such as security, (waste) water management, food safety, health,
    energy transition and circularity by providing fit-for-purpose measurement technologies.
  • Creates new fields of innovation by connecting various application areas;
  • Creates inherent economic value through research, instrument development and commercial analytical services.

Community formation, bringing together analytical scientists and practitioners within and between disparate fields allows
them to:

  • share experiences, techniques and instruments;
  • foster cross-fertilization between disciplines and application areas;
  • combine analytical challenges and define roadmaps for innovation in the science;
  • define the human capital agenda for the field and organize additional education.