Patent ID: 7309568

Claim:
A method of obtaining fluorescent images of samples of fluorescent material, comprising the steps of: (a) moving a substrate in a first direction, said substrate comprising a an array of compartments for carrying said samples, each row in the array of compartments being seperated by an equal pitch distance; (b) sequentially irradiating said compartments in said array of compartments with an exciting light while moving said substrate in said first direction by scanning said exciting light over said pitch distance at substantially the same speed as the moving substrate, including varying an intensity of said exciting light from a first irradiating value to a second irradiating value during the period of time that one compartment is scanned; (c) detecting fluorescent light generated from each of said samples due to irradiation by said exciting light while cutting off light reflected from said substrate due to the scanning of said exciting light; and (d) determining a value of fluorescence as generated from each of said samples based upon information from said fluorescent light detected in step (c).