JPS61286758A - Automatic chemical analyser - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To obtain an analyser not requiring the inspection of pure water transmitting quantity, easy to maintain and excellent in operability and reliability, by performing the measurement of a specimen by using only a reaction cell judged to have no factor exerting adverse effect on the measurement of the specimen. CONSTITUTION:A cumulative data calculation control part 33 calculates the cumulative number of times, cumulative value and cumulative average thereof on the basis of photometric data at every individual reaction cell to store the same and performs the initial setting and renewal of the cumulative number of times and the cumulative value. A pure water value inspection part 36 calculates photometric data at every individual reaction cell and the deviation with the cumulative average thereof and judges whether the deviation is within a tolerant range to store judge information in a reaction cell judge table 37. A distribution/ photometric control part 47 performs control so as to perform the distribution and photometry of a specimen and a reagent only to the corresponding reaction cell on the basis of reaction cell information judged to be present in the tolerant range among the judge information stored in the judge table 37.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Technical Field of the Invention] The present invention relates to a direct photometry type automatic chemical analyzer capable of determining factors that adversely affect measurements on a large number of reaction cells.

[Technical Precedence of the Invention W41 Recent automated chemical analyzers have increased throughput,
There is a trend toward increasing the number of photometric items and miniaturizing samples to reduce running costs.

The miniaturization of the sample amount was addressed by adopting a reaction tube direct photometry method, and the increase in processing capacity and measurement items was addressed by increasing the number of reaction cells and photometry sections.

By the way, when we observe the factors that cause the photometric data to deteriorate in the above-mentioned device, we find that air bubbles adhere to the reaction cell and scatter the measurement light, or foreign matter gets mixed in and blocks the measurement light, making it impossible to obtain the true amount of light transmitted to the sample. Although the minimum detectable light level of the photometer remains constant, the amount of transmitted light decreases due to contamination of the reaction cell, which reduces the resolution of the altimeter - and furthermore, For example, the percentage of measurement light that hits the photometer becomes stray light without reaching the photometer increases, which increases the percentage of errors in the measurement data.

In order to verify the factors that cause such deterioration of measurement data, in an automatic chemical analyzer using direct photometry, pure water is injected into a reaction cell, and the reaction cell is run immediately to obtain transmitted light I of the pure water. (Hereinafter also referred to as "rloO%T value".)
Based on this, verification methods are used to determine the presence or absence of air bubbles in the reaction cell, the presence of foreign matter, the degree of contamination, etc. These 10
0%T (!Ios) If the amount of transmitted light of the unknown sample is 1 and the absorbance of the unknown sample is E, then these relationships are as follows (1) formula % Formula % The amount of transmitted light ■ is a factor that has an adverse effect on the measurement. It is necessary to memorize it for each reaction cell and display it on a printer etc. in order for the operator to verify it.The above factors occur when measuring the transmitted light ff1I of pure water and when measuring a sample, but especially The measurement of the amount of transmitted light (2) in pure water is normally performed only when the Wi source of the apparatus is turned on, and the value of the transmitted light amount is used every time in subsequent sample measurements, so the memory 5 display of the amount of transmitted light has an important meaning.

On the other hand, in verifying sample measurements, the reaction absorbance range and concentration range are checked, and in the event of an abnormality, information is added as a data error and remeasurement is performed, so the effort involved is surprisingly small.

[Problems with the Background Art] However, in conventional verification methods, the amount of transmitted light of each pure water obtained from a large number of reaction cells was displayed as is on a printer, etc., so the operator was unable to navigate through the huge amount of photometric data. It was necessary to search for abnormal data, and there was a strong possibility that verification would be overlooked.

There is also a method of displaying the determination result of pure water transmitted light III, but you may have to redo the pure water transmitted light measurement again.
The reaction cell must be re-cleaned, and maintenance to maintain the accuracy of measurement results is not easy.

These problems are solved by the processing speed of recent automatic chemical analyzers, which have a processing speed of 300 samples/hour and a maximum of 32 items (colorimetry only).
, maximum reaction time 420 seconds (7 minutes), number of reaction cells 140
This is noticeable in high-performance devices such as eight.

[Object of the Invention] The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and it eliminates the need to verify the amount of transmitted light of pure water, and provides easy maintenance and operability.
The purpose of this invention is to provide an automatic chemical analyzer using direct photometry with excellent reliability.

[Summary of the Invention] One key aspect of the present invention to achieve the above object is to determine the suitability of a reaction cell based on photometric data of each reaction cell obtained by direct photometry by injecting pure water into a large number of reaction cells. In a self-help chemical analyzer designed to verify the process, the cumulative number, cumulative value, and cumulative average are calculated and stored based on the photometric data of each individual reaction cell, and the cumulative number and cumulative value can be initialized and updated. a pure water value verification unit that calculates the deviation between the photometric data of each reaction cell and its cumulative average and determines whether the a deviation is within an allowable range; A storage means for storing judgment information by the value verification section, and a sample is applied only to corresponding reaction cells based on reaction cell information judged to be within an allowable range among the judgment information stored in the storage means.

The device is characterized by having a dispensing/photometry control section that controls the dispensing of reagents and photometry.

[Embodiments of the Invention] Examples of the present invention will be described in detail below. FIG. 1 shows a schematic configuration of an embodiment apparatus, in which 1 is an automatic chemical analysis section and 2 is an analytical data processing section.

The automatic chemical analysis section 1 supports a large number of reaction cells 4 in a circular shape, and is driven by a reaction disk drive section 55 controlled by the CPU 50 of the analysis data processing section 2, which will be described later, to perform one reaction in the direction of the arrow in the figure. A reaction disk 3 that rotates intermittently at cell intervals and a large number of sample containers 6 containing various samples are supported in a circular shape and are driven by the reaction disk drive section 55 to move in the same direction as the reaction disk 3 in the direction of the arrow in the figure. A sample disk 5 that rotates, a pure water bottle 7 filled with pure water, a pure water supply pump 8 and a pure water injection nozzle 9 that are fed by the CPU 50, and a pure water bottle 7 that injects pure water into each reaction cell 4. A water injection part 10 and a reagent bottle 11 filled with reagents. a reagent injection unit 14 that includes a reagent pump 12 and a reagent injection nozzle 13 and injects a reagent into each reaction cell 4, which is controlled by the CPU 50;
a sampling unit 17 that includes a sampling nozzle 15 and a sampling pump 16 that move between the sample container 6 on the sample disk 5 and the reaction cell 4 on the reaction disk 3 under the control of Light source lamps 18 placed across the movement path of the cell 4
and altimeter 19 f, 1J11 by CPLJ50
a photometry system 20 that is cleaned by the CPU 50; a cleaning and drying section 23 that cleans and dries the reaction cell 4, which is equipped with a cleaning syringe 21 and a nozzle 22 that are cleaned by the CPU 50; Reaction discharge means (not shown)
and 1u11' section 2 for stirring the reaction solution in the reaction cell.
4.

Here, the reaction disk 3 will be explained in more detail.

Now, when the 48 reaction cells 4 are at the positions shown in FIG. 2, the positions of each reaction cell 4 are designated as P1 to Pas
The sample dispensing position is Pl, the sample dispensing position is P2, the pure water supply position is Pse, the stirring position is Pl9, and the photometry position is P.
li, the reaction liquid drain position is P36, and the washing drying position is P37.
~P40 respectively.

The reaction disk drive section 55 is controlled by the CPU 50 and drives the reaction disk 3 and the sampling disk 5.
At the same time, a signal (reaction cell number) corresponding to a specific reaction cell 4 on the reaction disk 3 is sent to the pure water value verification section 36 of the analytical data processing section 2.

Incidentally, when each reaction cell 4 is located at a position as shown in FIG. 2, this position will be referred to as a "home position". The CPU 50 is configured to be able to recognize the home position and subsequent rotational position of each reaction cell 4, respectively.

Before! ! As shown in FIG. 3, the atll optical system 20 is arranged so that the optical path from the light source lamp 18 to the photometer 19 passes through the reaction cell 4 at the photometric position tpU. The photometer 19 includes a diffraction grating 25 that receives light from the light source lamp 18, a slit 26 that allows the diffracted light from the diffraction grating 25 to pass through, and receives the diffracted light that has passed through the slit 26 and converts it into an electrical signal. It is equipped with a detector 27 that sends out photometric data of the reaction cell 4.

Next, the analysis data processing section 2 will be explained in detail.

The analytical data processing section 2 includes an A/D converter that converts the photometric data from the photometric system 20 into analog and digital, as shown in FIG.
a D converter 31; a data import unit 32 that imports photometric data converted into a digital signal and sends it out;
A cumulative data calculation unit 33 for calculating and storing the cumulative number of times, cumulative value, and cumulative average of each photometric data based on the photometric data, and also initializing these cumulative data, and the cumulative average. , 11 inputs the optical data and the reaction cell number representing the specific reaction cell 4 from the reaction disk drive section 55, and calculates the deviation between the photometric data of the specific reaction cell 4 and the cumulative average based on these data. A deviation calculation unit 34 that determines whether or not this deviation is within a preset tolerance range, and sends determination information indicating that it is acceptable if it is within the tolerance range and defective if it is outside the tolerance range. Part 35
As shown in FIG. 6, the judgment information from the pure water value verification section 36 consisting of
〇, a reaction cell judgment table 37 as a storage means for storing a binary signal such as defective≠0, and only reaction cell numbers judged as good from this reaction cell judgment table 37 are selected;
Based on this, the reagent injection section 14 and the sampling section 171
It includes a dispensing/photometry control section 47 that controls the reaction disk drive section 55 and the photometry system 20, and a printer 46 that is a display means for displaying the photometry data, determination information, and the like.

The cumulative data calculation control unit 33 has 48
Input the cumulative number of times of the corresponding reaction cell 4 read out from the cumulative table 38, which is a memory that stores the cumulative number of times and the cumulative value of each reaction cell 4, the photometric data from the data importing section 32, and the cumulative number of times of the corresponding reaction cell 4. , the cumulative number is the initial value (-0
), input the input photometric data as the cumulative value of the reaction cell 4 corresponding to the cumulative table 38, set the cumulative number to 1, and input the photometric data for each reaction cell 4 from the cumulative table 38. A cumulative average calculation section 40 reads out the cumulative number of times and cumulative values, performs a brightening process to obtain a cumulative average, and sends it to the deviation calculation section 34; and a cumulative average calculation section 40 that inputs photometric data from the determination section 35 and calculates the cumulative average based on this photometric data. It has a cumulative operation section 41 that updates the cumulative number and cumulative value of the corresponding reaction cell 4 in table 38, and an initialization section 42 that initializes the cumulative number and cumulative value of each reaction cell 4 in the cumulative table 38. It is configured as follows.

As shown in FIG. 1, the analysis data processing section 2 includes an operation panel 43 and an interface 44 for receiving signals between each component, and the first accumulation section 39. Cumulative average calculation unit 40. The accumulation operation section 41, the initialization section 42, the pure water value verification section 36, and the dispensing/photometry control section 47 are included in the CPU 50.

Next, the operation of the embodiment apparatus having the above configuration is shown in FIG. 7, which is a flowchart showing the overall processing process of this apparatus, and FIG. The explanation will be given with reference to the graph shown. Note that the wavelength of the light emitted from the light source lamp 18 is λ, the 100% value of the normal reaction cell 4 at this time is To, and the 100% value of the dirty reaction cell 4 is T1.

Also, the photometric position @ at the home position shown in Figure 2 is
It is assumed that pure water has already been injected into the reaction cell 4 in Pu by the pure water injector 10.

The light source lamp 18 of the photometric system 20 converts the light of wavelength λ into the photometric position [P
radiate to the reaction cell 4 located at a.

This light passes through the reaction cell 4 and the pure water therein and passes through the photometer 1.
9 is diffracted by the diffraction grating 25, passes through the slit 26, and is detected by the detector 27. At this time, if the reaction cell 4 is dirty, the 100% T (if
f becomes T1, and this value is input to the A/D converter 31 as photometric data.

On the other hand, if the reaction cell 4 is not dirty, then
The 00% value is To, and this value is taken as photometric data and A/D
input to converter 31;

The A/D converter 31 converts the input photometric data into a digital signal and sends it to the initial accumulation section 39 via the data acquisition section 32.

The initial cumulative 8% section 39 reads the cumulative number of times of the reaction cell 4 corresponding to the input photometric data from the cumulative number of times, and if the cumulative number of times is the initial value, writes this photometric data to the cumulative number of times and records the cumulative number of times. Set it to 1.

On the other hand, if the cumulative number read from the cumulative table 38 is not the initial value, the initial cumulative unit 39 sends the photometric data to the deviation calculating unit 34.

In parallel with the operation of this initial accumulation section 39, the cumulative average calculation section 4
0 reads the cumulative number and cumulative value of the reaction cell 4 corresponding to the photometric data from the cumulative table 39, calculates the cumulative average by dividing the cumulative number (a/cumulative number), and calculates the cumulative average.
Send to 4.

The deviation calculating section 34 calculates the deviation between the photometric data and the cumulative average based on the reaction cell number from the reaction cell driving section 55, and sends the photometric data and the calculated deviation to the determining section 35. The determination unit 35 determines the deviation within a predetermined range (for example, 51 Abs) based on the input deviation and photometric data.
If it is within this range, the photometric data is sent to the cumulative operation unit 41, the cumulative value and cumulative number of the corresponding reaction cell 4 in the cumulative table 38 are updated, and the determination result is Judgment information indicating that the cell is good is sent to the reaction cell judgment table 37.

On the other hand, if the determination unit 35 determines that the deviation is outside the allowable range or that the photometric data is erroneous data or no data (O value), the reaction cell information corresponding to the photometric data, For example, the reaction cell number is sent to the printer 36 and printed out, and judgment information indicating that the reaction cell is defective is stored in the reaction cell judgment table 37. In this case, the photometric data is not sent from the determination section 35 to the accumulation operation section 41 and the accumulation table 38 is not updated.

The dispensing/photometry control section 47 calls the number of the reaction cell located at the sample dispensing position P1, and also calls a signal from the judgment table 37 indicating whether the reaction cell is good or bad. Each section is adjusted so that the sample is dispensed using only the reaction cell 4 that has been prepared. At this time, the sampling section 17 controlled by the dispensing/photometry control section 47 is activated, and the reaction cell 4 at the sample dispensing position P1 is activated.
The sample is dispensed.

Next, the reaction cell 4 into which the sample has been dispensed in the same order as described above is sent to the sample dispensing position [P2, where the reagent is injected by the reagent injector 14.

The dispensing/photometry control section 47 then controls the reaction disk drive section 5.
5, the reaction cell 4 into which the sample and reagent have been injected is stirred by the stirring unit 24, and then rotated to the photometry position P22, and the photometry system 20 is controlled to perform photometry of the reaction cell 4 at the photometry position Pzz. .

Incidentally, the amount of pure water 10
In the process from measuring 0%T (!) to dispensing the sample, the reaction cell 4 filled with pure water is once sent to the washing and drying positions WIP37 to P4o, where the pure water is discharged and dried. Needless to say.

In the above process, if the reaction cell to be inspected by the dispensing/photometry control unit 47 falls under the defective condition in the judgment table 37, the dispensing/photometry control is not performed and the next reaction cell is subjected to inspection. This is repeated intermittently until a good reaction cell is reached.

In this way, according to the apparatus of this embodiment, the pure water verification section 36
Samples and reagents are self-injected into the reaction cells 4 for which it was determined that there are no factors that would adversely affect the measurement and used for measurement, eliminating the need to verify 100% Tll itself and reducing equipment maintenance. It is possible to achieve ease of operation and ease of operation, and to improve the reliability of photometric data.

The present invention is not limited to the embodiments described above, and various modifications can be made within the scope of the invention.

For example, the cumulative number of times a cumulative table is written sequentially.

The cumulative value, the cumulative average value calculated by the cumulative average calculation section, the deviation value calculated by the deviation calculation section, and the judgment result by the judgment section are displayed in correspondence with each reaction cell, for example, on a CRT.
It can also be easily displayed on the screen.

[Effects of the Invention] According to the present invention described in detail above, the measurement of the sample is performed using only reaction cells that have been determined to have no adverse effects on the measurement of the sample. It is possible to provide a direct photometry type self-help chemical analyzer that does not require an operator to verify the amount of transmitted light itself, is easy to maintain, and has excellent operability and reliability of measurement data.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Fig. 1 is a schematic explanatory diagram of an embodiment of the device of the present invention, Fig. 2 is an explanatory diagram showing the state of the home position of the reaction disk in the same device, and Fig. 3 is a schematic diagram of the photometry system and analytical data processing section of the same device. 4 is a block diagram showing the configuration of the analytical data processing section of the device, FIG. 5 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of the cumulative table of the device, and FIG. 6 is a reaction cell judgment table of the device. The explanatory diagram, FIG. 7, is a flowchart showing the overall operation of the device, and FIG. 8 is a graph showing the 100% T value of a normal reaction cell and a dirty reaction cell. 1...Self-help chemical analysis section, 2...Analysis data processing section, 4...Reaction cell, 20...Photometry system, 33...
Cumulative data calculation control unit, 36...Pure water value verification unit, 37...Reaction cell judgment table, 47...Dispensing/photometry! II Part 111.

Claims (1)

[Claims] In an automatic chemical analyzer that verifies the suitability of a reaction cell based on the photometric data of each reaction cell obtained by direct photometry by injecting pure water into a large number of reaction cells, photometry of each individual reaction cell is performed. A cumulative data calculation control unit that calculates and stores the cumulative number of times, cumulative value, and cumulative average based on the data, and can initialize and update the cumulative number of times and cumulative value, and the photometric data of each individual reaction cell and its A pure water value verification unit that calculates the deviation from the cumulative average and determines whether the deviation is within an allowable range; a storage unit that stores determination information by the pure water value verification unit; The dispensing and photometry control unit controls the dispensing of samples and reagents and photometry only to the corresponding reaction cells based on the reaction cell information that is determined to be within the allowable range among the determination information. Characteristic automatic chemical analyzer.