Patent ID: 8185324

Claim:
A method of determining an initial concentration of a target nucleic acid in a sample using real-time nucleic acid amplification data, the method comprising: (a) amplifying the target nucleic acid and detecting signals from an amplified product at different points of time during the amplification; (b) obtaining an amplification efficiency of the target nucleic acid with respect to time using the detected signals, wherein the amplification efficiency is represented by Formula 1 below, E n = R n - R n - 1 R n - 1 ( Formula ⁢ ⁢ 1 ) wherein E n refers to an amplification efficiency at n th cycle, R n−1 refers to an amplification signal at (n−1) th amplification cycle, and R n refers to an amplification signal at n th amplification cycle, and n refers to an integer greater than 2; (c) formulating an amplification efficiency function with respect to amplification time, wherein the amplification efficiency function is composed of geometric mean values of the amplification efficiency with respect to time; (d) applying the amplification efficiency function to calculate a point of amplification time at which the amplification efficiency has a maximum value; and (e) determining the initial concentration of the target nucleic acid in the sample using the calculated point of amplification time, wherein the initial concentration is determined using a reference curve, said reference curve being obtained employing the target nucleic acid of various known initial concentrations.