Patent ID: 8771949

Claim:
A method of identifying a target biomolecule, the method comprising: detecting the binding of each of N nucleic acid probe molecules to a target biomolecule to generate a target signature, which is defined by the binding frequencies of the individual N nucleic acid probe molecules to the target biomolecule, wherein N≧2 and each nucleic acid probe molecule has a unique configuration element that permits specific binding of the nucleic acid probe molecule to the target molecule, wherein the target biomolecule is a nucleic acid; comparing the target signature to a reference signature pool, wherein the reference signature pool comprises a reference signature for each of a plurality of reference biomolecules, and each reference signature is defined by the binding frequencies of the individual N nucleic acid probe molecules to a reference biomolecule; and identifying the target biomolecule as being identical to a reference biomolecule if the binding frequencies of the individual nucleic acid probe molecules in the target signature match those in the reference signature within a predetermined confidence level of about 95% or greater with respect to the N nucleic acid probe molecules, wherein identifying the target biomolecule further comprises: calculating a binding frequency distance (d) according to Equation (1) below, wherein x i denotes an i th binding frequency of the target signature, and y i denotes an i th binding frequency of each of the reference signatures in the reference signature pool; d ⁡ ( x → , y → ) = ∑ i = 1 N ⁢ ( x i - y i ) 2 Equation ⁢ ⁢ 1 and generating a target-reference distance distribution of binding frequency distance (d) defined by a number of counts with respect to each of the binding frequency distances (d), wherein the target biomolecule is identified as being identical to one of the reference biomolecules having a binding frequency distance (d) that is smaller or equal to a predetermined threshold in the target-reference distance distribution.