Highly polyploid somatic nucleus (macronucleus) of ciliate Bursaria truncatella under goes severe changes in morphology during cell division. At first, macronucleus (Ma) condences, diminishes in size and turns perpendicular to longitudinal axis of the cell. After short time, Ma turns again, elongates and only afterwards the process of division itself occurs. The biological meaning of these phenomena is not clear.Localization of RNA in the cells was performed on sections of ciliates B. truncatella, embedded in “Lowicryl K4M” at various stages: (1) before cell division (Figs. 2,3); (11) at the stage of macronucleus condensation; (111) during elongation of Ma (Fig.4); (1111) in young cells (0-5min. after division). For cytochemical labelling we used RNaseAcolloidal gold complexes (RNase-Au), which are known to bind to RNA containing cell ularstructures with high specificity. The influence of different parameters on the reliability and reproducibility of labelling was studied. In addition to the factors, discussed elsewhere, we found that the balance of mono- and bivalent cations is of great significance.