Patent ID: 7700295

Claim:
A kit for the detection and measurement of a positively charged transition element in a sample by an inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometer or an inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometer, where the measured transition element is a tag on a biologically active material that binds with at least one of an analyte and analyte complex, comprising: (a) at least one tag-organic moiety complex, wherein the at least one tag consists of one or more isotopes of one or more positively charged transition elements and the organic moiety is complexed to the tag, wherein the tag-organic moiety complex is capable of tagging a biologically active material; (b) instructions for i) tagging a biologically active material with the tag-organic moiety complex; ii) combining the tagged biologically active material with at least one of an analyte and analyte complex under conditions in which the tagged biologically active material binds with at least one of the analyte and analyte complex, iii) separating bound tagged biologically active material from unbound material, and iv) detecting and measuring the positively charged transition element by an inductively coupled mass spectrometer or an inductively coupled optical emission spectrometer; and (c) packaging means, wherein said transition element is any element having an atomic number of 21-29, 39-47, 57-79 or 89.