Patent ID: 7283229

Claim:
A small object identifying method comprising: a dispersion step comprising dispersing a large quantity of several kinds of small objects labeled by a combination of the presence/absence or measure of label elements of several kinds; a measuring step comprising distributing and associating kinds of said label elements to two or more measurement points, and measuring the presence/absence or measure of said label elements of the kinds which have been associated with respective measurement points, for the dispersed said small objects, at respective measurement points having a relative temporal relationship between measurement points; an identifying step comprising associating the measurement results measured at each measurement point, based on said temporal relationship and a positional relationship between said measurement points, to thereby identify said small objects; and a displaying step comprising displaying the measurement results; wherein said label elements each comprise a luminescent material which requires excitation light to emit light; wherein in said measuring step, the emission light intensity and the excitation light intensity which simultaneously excites the luminescent material are measured; and wherein in said identifying step, the measurement value of the emission light intensity is corrected based on the measurement value for the strength of excitation light wavelength which is simultaneously obtained, to thereby identify said small object.