Multi-capillary electrophoresis instrument

A multi-capillary electrophoresis instrument comprising:

• E (≥2) capillaries into which E samples containing components labeled with G (≥2) fluorophores are injected and simultaneously electrophoresed;
• a laser-light source configured to irradiate measurement portions of the E capillaries disposed on the same plane with a laser beam;
• and
• an optical system that receives fluorescences of the G fluorophores excited by the laser beam when the G fluorophores pass through the measurement portions, wherein
• the optical system includes:
• a spectroscopic element configured to respectively disperse the fluorescences emitted from the E capillaries into F (≥2, F≥G) predetermined wavelength bands;
• and
• an image sensor having a plurality of two-dimensionally arranged pixels and configured to receive E×F dispersed fluorescences in E×F different bin regions on the image sensor,
• the image sensor is configured to:
• measure E×F signal intensities of the E×F dispersed fluorescences in the E×F bin regions;
• and
• acquire time-series data of the E×F signal intensities by continuous repeated measurements at a predetermined exposure time and a predetermined time interval,
• in a case where, in a bin region of any one of the E×F bin regions,
• a number of pixels in the bin region is denoted by Bm (≥1),
• the bin region is divided into Bs (≥1) hardware-binning regions,
• an average number of pixels of the Bs hardware-binning regions is denoted by Bh=1,
• a number of pixels of hardware binning in the bin region is denoted by Bh,
• a number of pixels of software binning in the bin region is denoted by Bs,
• B
• m
• =
• B
• h
• ×
• B
• s
• =
• B
• s
• ,
• and
• B
• m
• =
• B
• h
• =
• B
• s
• =
• 1
• ,
• total noise of the time-series data is classified into three components of readout noise of the image sensor, dark-current noise of the image sensor, and shot noise of background light, and
• when the total noise is denoted by N, the readout noise is denoted by Nr, the dark-current noise is denoted by Nd, and the shot noise is denoted by Ns, and
• a mixed noise is denoted by Nx and is represented by Nx2=Nr2+Nd2, and
• a shot-noise-mixing ratio is represented by a=Ns/Nx,
• Bs and a satisfy a predetermined relationship.