African Analytical Chemistry (Pure Science): a mixed-methods study of Pure Science mechanisms and measurable outcomes across African contexts

The present analysis clarifies a persistent ambiguity in African analytical chemistry between pure-science mechanisms that govern selectivity, signal formation and data transformation and the laboratory outcomes by which those mechanisms are judged. Textbooks codify Beer-Lambert behaviour, chromatographic resolution and electrochemical kinetics as universal principles, yet validation guidelines, chemometric practice and metrological traceability impose local conditions on how such principles become credible measurement claims in laboratories with uneven infrastructure, reference materials and maintenance regimes. It distinguishes three mechanism families, reconstructs their metrological counterparts in detection capability, trueness, precision and uncertainty, and specifies qualitative inquiry into laboratory practice alongside quantitative characterisation of instrumental response. The contribution is a bounded, testable framework for linking explanatory depth to evaluative discipline across diverse African settings without conflating understanding with performance. The framework is intended to strengthen curriculum design, method validation and interlaboratory comparability where pure science and practical constraint meet.