in situ hybridization
(redirected from in situ nucleic acid hybridization)Also found in: Medical.
in situ hybridization
[‚in ‚si·chü ‚hī·brəd·ə·zā·shən] (cell and molecular biology)
A technique permitting identification of particular deoxyribonucleic acid or ribonucleic acid sequences while these sequences remain in their original location in the cell. A cell or tissue is treated with a fixative and then exposed to a labeled (by radioactivity or fluorescence) single-stranded nucleic acid probe that hybridizes with the targeted nucleic acid sequence, revealing its location on a chromosome band when the hybridized sequence is analyzed microscopically.
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Scientific & Technical Terms, 6E, Copyright © 2003 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.