Peptide Nucleic Acid Clamping

**Semantic type:** Laboratory Procedure

**Definition:** A modification of the standard polymerase chain reaction that increases the ability to preferentially amplify mutant alleles in the presence of an excess of wild-type molecules. Wild-type molecules are rendered inactive for amplification by binding of a peptide nucleic acid (PNA) probe that hybridizes to wild-type sequence with greater affinity and under less stringent conditions.

**Synonyms:** - PCR Clamp - PCR Clamping - PNA-clamping - Peptide Nucleic Acid Clamp - Peptide Nucleic Acid-mediated Competitive-PCR Clamping