Patent ID: 7598047

Claim:
A method of comparing protein compositions between at least two different samples comprising: (a) preparing an extract of proteins from each of said at least two samples; (b) providing a set of matched luminescent dyes chosen from dyes capable of covalently binding to proteins within said extract of proteins, wherein each dye within said set (1) has a net charge which will maintain the overall net charge of the proteins upon such covalent binding and has ionic and pH characteristics whereby relative migration of a protein labeled with any one of said dyes is the same as relative migration of said protein labeled with another dye in said set, (2) emits luminescent light at a wavelength that is sufficiently different from the emitted luminescent light of remaining dyes in said set to provide a detectably different light signal; (c) reacting each extract of proteins of step (a) with a different dye from said set of step (b) to provide dye-labeled proteins; (d) mixing each of said dye labeled proteins to form a single mixture of different dye-labeled proteins; (e) separating the dye-labeled proteins of interest within said mixture; and (f) detecting the difference in luminescent intensity between the different dye-labeled proteins of interest by: capturing images of the dye-labeled proteins at different wavelengths of emitted luminescence; and processing the images to determine the difference in luminescent intensity.