Patent ID: 8055452

Claim:
A method of predicting change in a biological condition of a subject as a result of exposure to an agent, the method comprising: a) producing a first index for a sample from the subject in the absence of the agent, the sample providing a source of RNAs comprising: i) using amplification for quantitatively measuring the amount of RNA of at least two constituents from any one of Tables 1 through 12 from the sample from the subject, wherein a panel of constituents is selected so that measurement conditions of the constituents enables evaluation of said biological condition and wherein the measures of all constituents in the panel form a first profile data set, wherein said amplification for each constituent is under conditions that are (1) within a degree of repeatability of better than five percent; and (2) the efficiencies of amplification are within two percent; ii) using amplification for quantitatively measuring the amount of RNA of all constituents in said panel wherein the measures of all constituents in the panel are from a relevant population of subjects and form a normative baseline profile data set; and iii) applying values from the first profile data set to an index function derived using latent class modeling, thereby providing a single-valued measure of the biological condition so as to produce an index pertinent to the biological condition of the subject; wherein the index function also uses data from the normative baseline profile data set, b) producing a second index for a second sample from the subject in the presence of the agent, the second index based on the same panel of constituents; and c) using the first and second indices to predict change in the biological condition of the subject as a result of exposure to the agent.