The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Feb. 11, 2003
Filed:
Jul. 21, 2000
Michael R. Gambini, Bolton, MA (US);
John C. Voyta, Sudbury, MA (US);
John Atwood, late of Redding, CT (US);
Bruce E. DeSimas, II, Danville, CA (US);
Edward Lakatos, Bethel, CT (US);
Jeff Levi, Trumbull, CT (US);
Israel Metal, Flushing, NY (US);
George Sabak, Monroe, CT (US);
Yongdong Wang, Wilton, CT (US);
Tropix, Inc., Bedford, MA (US);
Abstract
A luminescence detecting apparatus and method for analyzing luminescent samples is disclosed. Luminescent samples are placed in a plurality of sample wells in a tray, and the tray is placed in a visible-light impervious chamber containing a charge coupled device camera. The samples may be injected in the wells, and the samples may be injected with buffers and reagents, by an injector. In the chamber, light from the luminescent samples pass through a collimator, a Fresnel field lens, a filter, and a camera lens, whereupon a focused image is created by the optics on the charge-coupled device (CCD) camera. The use of a Fresnel field lens, in combination with a collimator and filter, reduces crosstalk between samples below the level attainable by the prior art. Preferred embodiments of the luminescence detecting apparatus and method disclosed include central processing control of all operations, multiple wavelength filter wheel, and robot handling of samples and reagents. Preferred embodiments of processing software integrated with the invention include elements for mechanical alignment, outlier shaving, masking, manipulation of multiple integration times to expand the dynamic range, crosstalk correction, dark subtraction interpolation and drift correction, multi-component analysis applications specifically tailored for luminescence, and uniformity correction.