Agilent Technologies has received US Patent No. 7,534,561, “Nucleic acid array in situ fabrication methods and arrays produced using the same.” The patent claims methods and devices for producing nucleic acid arrays using in situ nucleic acid array synthesis protocols. According to the patent’s abstract, control probes are produced in columns on the arrays, and the probes are selected according to a particular protocol. An ‘all-bases-all-layers’ probe set is also produced in at least one column on the arrays. Also claimed are methods and devices for using such arrays.
Agilent has also received US Patent No. 7,534,563, “Methods for producing ligand arrays.” Methods for producing ligand substrates and arrays, such as peptide and nucleic acid arrays, as well as the arrays produced and kits for using them, are claimed. According to the methods, a substrate is provided that includes photocleavable functional groups that produce surface-bound photocleavage-produced functional groups upon irradiation. The photocleavable groups are then cleaved to produce a surface that displays desired functional groups. The resultant substrates are then contacted with ligands, resulting in covalent attachment of the contacted ligands to the surface.
Canon has received US Patent No. 7,534,566, “Nucleic acid labeling method and liquid composition.” The patent claims a nucleic acid labeling method that can reduce the amount of a labeling substance used in an experiment, and can incorporate the labeling substance into a product, in this case, a target nucleic acid to be detected. By labeling the target nucleic acid sequence while it is amplified by PCR, at least one type from among four types of substrates A, T, C and G is chosen as a substrate to be labeled, the patent states. The concentration of the chosen substrates is then adjusted to be lower than that of the non-chosen substrates, and the labeled substrates are contained in the chosen substrates.
Canon has also received US Patent No. 7,534,621, “Method of producing probe medium and method of immobilizing probe using probe medium.” The patent claims a method of immobilizing a probe on a substrate. According to the patent, the probe is capable of specifically binding to a target substance. More specifically, the method includes the steps of: a) preparing a probe medium including a probe, an organic solvent that includes a coupling agent for coupling the probe to the substrate, and a substance for making the probe soluble in the organic solvent; and b) spotting the probe medium on a substrate, where the coupling agent is silane, and where the substance for making the probe soluble is a cationic surfactant.
The University of California of Oakland has received US Patent No. 7,534,567, “Detection of nucleic acid sequence differences by comparative genomic hybridization.” The patent claims a method of detecting nucleotide sequence differences between two nucleic acid samples. The method uses comparative genomic hybridization to analyze the sequence differences between the samples, permitting the identification of small sequence differences in nucleic acid samples of high complexity. The method calls for: a) labeling nucleic acids from each sample with a different label; b) contacting the labeled nucleic acids from each sample with target nucleic acids, where either the labeled nucleic acids or the target nucleic acids, or both, have had repetitive sequences blocked or removed; and c) comparing the intensities of the signals from labeled nucleic acids hybridized to the target nucleic acids to detect one or more nucleotide sequence differences between the samples.
ST Microelectronics of Geneva, Switzerland, has received US Patent No. 7,536,045, “Method for the analysis of array images and device.” The patent claims a method of image analysis applicable to the analysis of arrays, such as DNA or protein microarrays. The method is accomplished by: a) determining the shapes and relative locations of the spots on the array image by generating a binary map of pixels defining boundaries of the luminous spots on the background; b) isolating each spot by an extraction step using the binary map; c) analyzing the spots by using preset criteria to identify specific clusters of pixels; and d) determining relative characteristic parameters and indexes of quality for each spot.