| abstract |
A process of identifying a plurality of biological samples having particular desirable attributes by testing pooled samples and selecting, for intended uses such as transfusion, or for subsequent analysis that is thereby enriched for such samples, pooled samples which have, or may have, said desirable attributes.. The preferred number of samples per pool "d" is determined by setting d as an integer which produces the maximum or a value near the maximum of the product of: d times the expected number of unambiguous sample pools, where a sample pool is unambiguous if all of the samples have the desirable attributes, and is otherwise ambiguous if at least one sample has the desirable attributes. The value selected as d can be greater than the maximum product above, so as to enlarge the total number of samples assayed in determining the desirable attributes. |