Genomics Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, 1 Cyclotron Road MS 84-171, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA.
Dev Cell. 2011 Oct 18;21(4):611-26. doi: 10.1016/j.devcel.2011.09.008.
To understand how transcription factors function, it is essential to determine the range of genes that they each bind and regulate in vivo. Here I review evidence that most animal transcription factors each bind to a majority of genes over a quantitative series of DNA occupancy levels. These continua span functional, quasifunctional, and nonfunctional DNA binding events. Factor regulatory specificities are distinguished by quantitative differences in DNA occupancy patterns. I contrast these results with models for transcription networks that define discrete sets of direct target and nontarget genes and consequently do not fully capture the complexity observed in vivo.
为了理解转录因子的功能，确定它们在体内结合和调控的基因范围是至关重要的。在这里，我回顾了证据，证明大多数动物转录因子在定量的 DNA 占有率系列中都结合了大多数基因。这些连续谱跨越了功能、准功能和非功能的 DNA 结合事件。因子调节特异性通过 DNA 占有率模式的定量差异来区分。我将这些结果与转录网络模型进行了对比，后者定义了直接靶基因和非靶基因的离散集合，因此不能完全捕捉到体内观察到的复杂性。
