Giemsa banding patterns in normal donors and in chronic lymphocytic leukaemia

A method of obtaining banded chromosomes based on the DNA hybridization technique is described. Chromosome preparations treated with NaOH followed by incubation in phosphate buffer and staining in Giemsa showed distinct banding patterns which enabled their positive identification. Banding patterns from 50 normal donors were examined and a banding pattern for each chromosome established. The banding patterns were compared with those in the literature and the description published by the Paris Conference (1971): Standardization in Human Cytogenetics. There was good agreement between authors regarding the major bands. However, in this study 80 additional bands to those described by the Paris Conference were detected