Special issue on Statistical and Probabilistic Methods for Metrology, Foreword

This special issue of Metrologia is the first that is not devoted to units, or constants, or measurement techniques in some specific field of metrology, but to the generic topic of statistical and probabilistic methods for metrology. The number of papers on this subject in measurement journals, and in Metrologia in particular, has continued to increase over the years, driven by the publication of the Guide to the Expression of Uncertainty in Measurement (GUM) [1] and the Mutual Recognition Arrangement (MRA) of the CIPM [2]. The former stimulated metrologists to think in greater depth about the appropriate modelling of their measurements, in order to provide uncertainty evaluations associated with measurement results. The latter obliged the metrological community to investigate reliable measures for assessing the calibration and measurement capabilities declared by the national metrology institutes (NMIs).