Nucleic acid sequence-based amplification, commonly referred to as NASBA, is a method in molecular biology which is used to produce multiple copies of single stranded RNA.
[1] NASBA is a two-step process that takes RNA and anneals specially designed primers, then utilizes an enzyme cocktail to amplify it.
[8] In order for successful amplification to occur, an enzyme cocktail containing, Avian Myeloblastosis Reverse Transcriptase (AMV-RT), RNase H, and RNA polymerase is used.
[11] One key aspect of NASBA is that the starting material and end product is always single stranded RNA.
NASBA was developed by J Compton in 1991, who defined it as "a primer-dependent technology that can be used for the continuous amplification of nucleic acids in a single mixture at one temperature".