Radiant energy – Luminophor irradiation – With ultraviolet source
Reexamination Certificate
2000-02-29
2001-12-11
Hannaher, Constantine (Department: 2878)
Radiant energy
Luminophor irradiation
With ultraviolet source
C250S459100
Reexamination Certificate
active
06329661
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a biochip scanner device used to detect and acquire fluorescence signal data from biological microchips (biochips) and method of use.
DESCRIPTION OF THE RELATED ART
At the present time, biochips, after being incubated with a sample solution containing fluorescently labeled target molecules are assayed using either a microscope equipped with a charge coupled device (CCD) camera or a laser scanner. Regardless of the technique of fluorescence measurement used, all known biochip analyzers are high-resolution imaging instruments. This means that their output data is essentially a digital image of the chip composed of approximately 1000N elementary data points, where N represents the number of biochip immobilization sites. As a biochip user is typically interested in relative fluorescence intensities of the immobilization sites, an image as the output data format is highly redundant and requires further processing before the data can be analyzed. This may include signal integration over the immobilization sites, background subtraction, and normalization. The image processing is especially difficult in the case of analyzers based on wide-field microscopes, in which both the sensitivity and the image background are inherently non-uniform.
Due to the restraints on allowable working distance of the objective lens, currently available imaging biochip analyzers cannot be readily used with biochips mounted in an optical flow cell. This feature would be very desirable in order to facilitate the use of an experimental setup designed for multiple biochip use. Further high-resolution imaging requires the use of sophisticated electronic and optical components, which increase the instrument's complexity and cost.
A need exists for an improved mechanism to detect and acquire fluorescence signal data from biological microchips (biochips).
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
A principal object of the present invention is to provide a biochip scanner device used to detect and acquire fluorescence signal data from biological microchips (biochips) and method of use. Other important objects of the present invention are to provide such method and biochip scanner device substantially without negative effect; and that overcome some disadvantages of prior art arrangements.
In brief, a biochip scanner device used to detect and acquire fluorescence signal data from biological microchips (biochips) and method of use are provided. The biochip scanner device includes a laser for emitting a laser beam. A modulator, such as an optical chopper modulates the laser beam. A scanning head receives the modulated laser beam and a scanning mechanics coupled to the scanning head moves the scanning head relative to the biochip.
In accordance with features of the invention, an optical fiber delivers the modulated laser light to the scanning head. The scanning head serves for both focusing the excitation laser light onto the biochip and collecting the emitted fluorescence which is then delivered to a photodiode via the same optical fiber. The biochip scanner device is used in a row scanning method to scan selected rows of the biochip with the laser beam size matching the size of the immobilization sites.
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Belgovskiy Alexander I.
Mirzabekov Andrei D.
Perov Alexander
Gagliardi Albert
Hannaher Constantine
Pennington Joan
The University of Chicago
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