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PCR-RFLP

Definition

PCR followed by restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis. A restriction enzyme cuts the amplicon at species-specific recognition sites; the resulting fragment pattern on a gel identifies the species. Rapid and cheap for known species pairs (e.g., cattle vs horse) but requires prior knowledge of the restriction site distribution.

Related terms

16S rRNA
The small-subunit ribosomal RNA gene in bacteria (~1,550 bp). The V3-V4 hypervariable region (~470 bp) is amplified with universal bacterial primers for...
BOLD Systems
Barcode of Life Data System (University of Guelph, Canada). Holds over 9 million COI reference barcodes linked to voucher specimens, with mandatory...
COI (COX1)
Cytochrome-c oxidase subunit I gene. The 658-base-pair Folmer fragment is the globally adopted barcode-of-life marker for animals, curated in BOLD Systems and...
Cytochrome B (Cyt B)
A mitochondrial protein-coding gene widely used in forensic species identification before COI barcoding was standardised. Still used because its reference database for...
ITS Region
Internal transcribed spacer region, flanking the 5.8S rRNA gene between the 18S and 28S subunits in fungi and plants. The ITS1-5.8S-ITS2 fragment...
SILVA
Curated ribosomal RNA sequence database (Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, Bremen). Provides quality-filtered 16S, 18S, 23S, and 28S reference alignments for...

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