Center for Pediatric Biomedical Research, Department of Pediatrics, University of Rochester, NY 14627, USA.
Cell. 2011 Feb 4;144(3):327-39. doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2011.01.024.
Biological differences among metazoans and between cell types in a given organism arise in large part due to differences in gene expression patterns. Gene-distal enhancers are key contributors to these expression patterns, exhibiting both sequence diversity and cell type specificity. Studies of long-range interactions indicate that enhancers are often important determinants of nuclear organization, contributing to a general model for enhancer function that involves direct enhancer-promoter contact. However, mechanisms for enhancer function are emerging that do not fit solely within such a model, suggesting that enhancers as a class of DNA regulatory element may be functionally and mechanistically diverse.
后生动物之间以及给定生物体中不同细胞类型之间的生物学差异在很大程度上是由于基因表达模式的差异造成的。基因远端增强子是这些表达模式的主要贡献者，表现出序列多样性和细胞类型特异性。长距离相互作用的研究表明，增强子通常是核组织的重要决定因素，为增强子功能的一般模型做出了贡献，该模型涉及直接的增强子-启动子接触。然而，出现的增强子功能机制并不完全符合这种模型，这表明增强子作为一类 DNA 调控元件可能在功能和机制上具有多样性。
