Abstract
The paper reviews different mathematical methods for the exploitation of the UV spectrum of waters and wastewaters, including the interferences treatment. After the presentation of simple methods and their limits, several global approaches using a matricial presentation of the data are discussed. The usual methods, statistical multivariate or deterministical procedures are not relevant. Nevertheless, other methods based on the restitution of interferences effect as a combination of fixed basic signals, either mathematical or physical, are available. The first procedure is semi-deterministic without chemical knowledge of the interferences nature or effects-and only mathematical hypothesis on the spectrum shape-while the second is a more qualitative method based on the fact that most of interferences can be resumed as a linear combination of few independent spectra with chemical signification. These considerations underline the importance of direct examination of UV spectra of waters and wastewaters.