"ˌ adjective
Etymology: hyper- + variable (I)
: relating to or being any of the relatively short polypeptide chain segments in the variable region of an antibody light chain or heavy chain that are extremely variable in the sequence of their amino acid residues and that determine the conformation and specificity of the site which recognizes and combines with an antigen ; also : relating to, containing, or being a highly variable nucleotide sequence (as in tandemly repeating DNA)