primer

Introduction

A molecule, often a small polymer, that initiates synthesis of a larger molecule.

In molecular biology:

DNA polymerase is dependent upon a small oligonucleotides as a primer to initiate replication. These primers are complementary & hydrogen-bonded to a sequence on the DNA strand to be replicated, resulting in a short segment of double-stranded DNA or DNA-RNA in the case of reverse transcriptase.

More general terms

• biochemistry