A Statistical Calibration Method based on Non-Linear Mixed Model for Affymetrix Probe Level Data

Gene expression microarrays allow a researcher to measure the simultaneous response of thousands of genes to external conditions. Affymetrix GeneChipr expression array technology has become a standard tool in medical research. Anyway, a preprocessing step is usually necessary in order to obtain a gene expression measure. Aim of this paper is to propose a calibration method to estimate the nominal concentration based on a non-linear mixed model. This method is an enhancement of a method proposed in Mineo et al. (2006). The relationship between raw intensities and concentration is obtained by using the Langmuir isotherm theory.