POOLING STRATEGIES FOR ESTABLISHING PHYSICAL GENOME MAPS USING FISH

Often, in biological studies, it is necessary to identify an organism' s chromosomes, In some organisms the individual chromosomes can be ide ntified by staining procedures while many other species have a very la rge number of chromosomes, often of similar size, which defy identific ation by traditional staining methods, We have devised strategies, bas ed on fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH), which allow the assign ment of a preset number of probes to each chromosome without prior chr omosome identification. By hybridizing mixtures of probes labeled with different colored fluorescent molecules, the chromosomal origin of ea ch probe can be determined.