Dissecting the molecular anatomy of the nervous system: analysis of RNA and protein expression in whole body sections of laboratory animals.

Nucleic acid hybridization and protein blotting procedures have allowed the specific detection of both RNA and protein gene products in whole body sections of a selected host. These procedures permit efficient and reproducible screening of both endogenous and exogenous (viral) gene products, thus facilitating the study of normal differentiation, the localization of virus and the monitoring of viral diseases. Although success with RNA hybridization has thus far been limited to exogenous viral gene expression, the protein immunoblotting procedures have the sensitivity to detect endogenous protein products with high resolution. These combined procedures should prove useful for the study of protein expression in numerous developmental systems.