Patent ID: 7912651

Claim:
A method for identifying a mechanism of action on predetermined cellular signaling pathways for a biologically active agent on a mammalian cell in a cell culture, using at least two cell culture assay combinations, wherein a first cell culture assay combination of said at least two comprises at least two factors sufficient to activate two or more cell signaling pathways in said cell, in said cell culture, and a second cell culture assay combination of said at least two is a control cell culture identical to said first cell culture except for lacking said biologically active agent; and wherein said mechanism of action was previously unknown for said biologically active agent, said method comprising: contacting said first cell culture with said biologically active agent; incubating said cell cultures; and measuring, simultaneously or in sequence, at least three parameters normalized to be a ratio of test to control data on said second cell culture assay combination whose levels respond to up or down regulation of at least one of said pathways and normalizing to generate a biomap; wherein the mechanism of action in cellular pathways of said biologically active agent is identified by analyzing said biomap by a multiparameter pattern recognition algorithm to quantify relatedness of said biomap to reference biomaps that include predetermined agents that target specific pathways, wherein the presence or absence of relatedness to said reference biomaps provides a characterization of said agent mechanism of action; and wherein each of said three parameters is modulated by at least one component in one of the assay combinations used to generate the biomap of the biologically active agent or to generate the reference biomaps.