Polymerase Chain Reaction

In vitro method for producing large amounts of specific DNA or RNA fragments of defined length and sequence from small amounts of short oligonucleotide flanking sequences (primers). The essential steps include thermal denaturation of the double-stranded target molecules, annealing of the primers to their complementary sequences, and extension of the annealed primers by enzymatic synthesis with DNA polymerase. The reaction is efficient, specific, and extremely sensitive. Uses for the reaction include disease diagnosis, detection of difficult-to-isolate pathogens, mutation analysis, genetic testing, DNA sequencing, and analyzing evolutionary relationships.

Year introduced: 1991(1990)

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Tree Number(s): E05.393.620.500

MeSH Unique ID: D016133

Entry Terms:

• Polymerase Chain Reactions
• Reaction, Polymerase Chain
• Reactions, Polymerase Chain
• PCR
• Anchored PCR
• PCR, Anchored
• Anchored Polymerase Chain Reaction
• Inverse PCR
• PCR, Inverse
• Inverse Polymerase Chain Reaction
• Nested Polymerase Chain Reaction
• Nested PCR
• PCR, Nested

Previous Indexing:

• Gene Amplification (1988-1989)

See Also:

• Sequence Tagged Sites
• Ligase Chain Reaction

All MeSH Categories
Analytical, Diagnostic and Therapeutic Techniques and Equipment Category
Investigative Techniques
Genetic Techniques
Nucleic Acid Amplification Techniques
Polymerase Chain Reaction
Amplified Fragment Length Polymorphism Analysis
Multiplex Polymerase Chain Reaction
Primed In Situ Labeling
Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA Technique
Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction
Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction