Chemistry: molecular biology and microbiology – Apparatus – Including condition or time responsive control means
Reexamination Certificate
2001-01-12
2002-07-02
Redding, David A. (Department: 1744)
Chemistry: molecular biology and microbiology
Apparatus
Including condition or time responsive control means
C435S287200
Reexamination Certificate
active
06413766
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to methods and apparatus for performing rapid and accurate heating and cooling of a sample. More specifically, the present invention relates to methods and apparatus for performing non-contact, rapid and accurate thermocycling on micro to nanoliter volume samples, wherein each cycle can be completed in as little as a few seconds.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Numerous analytical methods require that a sample be heated to a particular temperature and then cooled to a particular temperature. Often, sequential heating and cooling steps, known as thermocycling, are required. Various methods involve cycling through two or more stages all with different temperatures, and/or involve maintaining the sample at a particular temperature stage for a given period of time before moving to the next stage. Accordingly, thermocycling of samples can become a time consuming process. In addition, these methods often require the precise control of temperature at each stage of the cycle; exceeding a desired temperature can lead to inaccurate results.
Two factors that are typically important, therefore, in the performance of effective thermocycling on a sample are the speed and homogeneity of the apparatus and methods used. Cycle times are largely defined by how quickly the temperature of the sample can be changed, and relate to the heat source itself and the rate of heat transfer to the sample. Uniformity of sample temperature is important to ensure that reproducible and reliable results are obtained. Typically, increasing cycle speeds makes it harder to maintain homogenous sample temperatures.
The concept of using elevated temperatures to effect chemical, biological and biochemical reactions is commonly known and expressed as the law of Arrhenius. Generally, an increase in temperature of a reaction translates into an increase in the rate of the reaction. Reaction parameters, such as the activation of the reaction, the increase in dissolution of the reaction components, the desolvation of the substrate and the specificity of the catalysis are temperature dependent. Exact or nearly exact maintenance of a reaction temperature is often critical in most biochemical/biological processes to guarantee their successful completion. Therefore, great efforts are made in the daily routine of a chemical/biochemical laboratory to control the temperature conditions during a reaction. It is expected that better temperature control increases the performance of most reactions, for example, increasing the specificity of proteolytic reactions.
There is particular interest in rapid and homogenous thermocycling when performing DNA amplification for the polymerase chain reaction (PCR). PCR is a process by which a single molecule of DNA (or RNA) from an organism can be amplified by a factor of 10
6
to 10
9
. This procedure requires the repetition of heating and cooling cycles in the presence of an original DNA target molecule, specific DNA primers, deoxynucleotide triphosphates, and DNA polymerase enzymes and cofactors. Heating accounts for a denaturing of the sample while cooling results in annealing of the sample. At a temperature typically between the denaturing and annealing temperatures, extension of the annealed primers using an enzyme occurs to replicate the DNA strand or portion of the strand. Extension of the primer can also occur at the same temperature as annealing, depending on the specifics of the reaction. Each heating/cooling cycle produces a doubling of the target DNA sequence, leading to an exponential accumulation of the target sequence. PCR based technology has been applied to a variety of analyses, including environmental and industrial contaminant identification, medical and forensic diagnostics, and biological research.
There are a number of biochemical reactions that require accurate and rapid thermocycling. Additionally, there are reactions whose specificity can be enhanced when conducted in a rapid and accurate thermocycling environment. The PCR reaction has very high demands on the accuracy of the thermocycling parameters and is, therefore, an ideal assay to test the accuracy of the thermocycling method and apparatus.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,683,202 generally describes the PCR concept, in which a stretch of DNA is copied using a polymerase. Generally, the procedure involves annealing a piece of primer DNA at a first temperature to any stretch of single-stranded DNA template with a complementary sequence. The DNA polymerase copies the primed piece of DNA at a second given temperature. At a third given temperature, the newly copied DNA and the primer dissociate from the template DNA, thereby regenerating single-stranded DNA. The temperature of the sample is returned to the first temperature to allow the primer to attach itself to any strand of single-stranded DNA with a complementary sequence, including the DNA strands that were synthesized in the immediately preceding cycle. In this manner, the template DNA is amplified or reproduced any number of times, depending on how many times the template DNA occurs in the sample, and the number of cycles completed. The procedure can also be performed using RNA.
Most existing methods and techniques of thermocycling in benchtop instrumentation are indirect with respect to the effect of the heating source on the sample. Most thermocycling approaches heat and/or cool a circulating medium, such as water or air, that affects the container which holds the sample and, subsequently, subjects the sample itself to the desired thermocycling process. The rate of the cycling process depends on the effectiveness of the heat transfer between the circulating medium and the sample.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,504,007 discloses a thermocycle apparatus having a body containing a thermally conductive liquid. The liquid is contained within the body of the apparatus, and the temperature of the liquid alternated between lower and higher temperatures in repeating cycles. A well or container for holding a sample of material is held in contact with the liquid and conducts the cyclic temperature changes of the liquid to the sample.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,576,218 discloses a method for thermocycling of nucleic acid assays using a blended fluid stream produced from constant velocity, constant volume, and constant temperature fluid streams. Using these streams, a variable temperature, constant velocity, constant volume fluid stream is introduced into a sample chamber for heating and cooling the samples contained therein. The temperature of the blended fluid stream is varied by diverting and altering the ratio of the constant temperature fluid streams relative to one another.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,508,197 discloses a thermocycling system based on the circulation of temperature controlled water directly to the underside of a thin-walled polycarbonate microtiter plate. The water flow is selected from a manifold fed by pumps from heated reservoirs.
Other methods are reported for heating a sample through use of heated air. U.S. Pat. No. 5,187,084 discloses an apparatus and method for performing thermocycling on a sample using an array of sample containing vessels supported in a reaction chamber, through which air at controlled temperatures is forcibly circulated as a heat-transfer medium in heat exchange relationship with the vessels. The temperature of the air is controlled as a function of time to provide a preselectable sequence defining a temperature profile. The profile is cyclically repetitively reproduced to effect replication of and amplification of the desired sequence of the DNA.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,460,780 discloses a device for rapidly heating and cooling a reaction vessel through various temperatures in PCR amplification utilizing a means for heating at least one side wall of a reaction vessel, means for cooling the heating means at repeated intervals and means for moving the reaction vessel and/or heating and cooling relative to each other. In one embodiment, heated air is used to heat the reaction vessel.
Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 5,455,175 demonstra
Craighead James R.
Hühmer Andreas
Landers James P
Oda Robert P.
Redding David A.
Thorp Reed & Armstrong LLP
University of Pittsburgh of the Commonwealth System
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