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Recent experiments show that transcription factors (TFs) indeed use the facilitated diffusion mechanism to locate their target sequences on DNA in living bacteria cells: TFs alternate between sliding motion along DNA and relocation events…
Cellular responses often require the fast activation or repression of specific genes, which depends on Transcription Factors (TFs) that have to quickly find the promoters of these genes within a large genome. Transcription Factors (TFs)…
Transcription Factors (TFs) are proteins that regulate gene expression. The regulation mechanism is via the binding of a TF to a specific part of the gene associated with it, the TF's target. The target of a specific TF corresponds to a…
To ensure fast gene activation, Transcription Factors (TF) use a mechanism known as facilitated diffusion to find their DNA promoter site. Here we analyze such a process where a TF alternates between 3D and 1D diffusion. In the latter (TF…
Transcription factor (TF) molecules translocate by facilitated diffusion (a combination of 3D diffusion around and 1D random walk on the DNA). Despite the attention this mechanism received in the last 40 years, only a few studies…
The model of facilitated diffusion describes how DNA-binding proteins, such as transcription factors (TFs), find their chromosomal targets by combining 3D diffusion through the cytoplasm and 1D sliding along nonspecific DNA sequences. The…
Transcription factors (TFs) are proteins that bind to specific sites on the DNA and regulate gene activity. Identifying where TF molecules bind and how much time they spend on their target sites is key for understanding transcriptional…
Under dilute in vitro conditions transcription factors rapidly locate their target sequence on DNA by using the facilitated diffusion mechanism. However, whether this strategy of alternating between three-dimensional bulk diffusion and…
Transcription factors are able to associate to their binding sites on DNA faster than the physical limit posed by diffusion. Such high association rates can be achieved by alternating between three-dimensional diffusion and one-dimensional…
We introduce a novel method to screen the promoters of a set of genes with shared biological function, against a precompiled library of motifs, and find those motifs which are statistically over-represented in the gene set. The gene sets…
We develop revised theoretical ideas on the mechanism by which the transcription factor proteins locate their specific binding sites on DNA faster than the three-dimensional (3D) diffusion controlled rate limit. We demonstrate that the…
Response time and transcription level are vital parameters of gene regulation. They depend on how fast transcription factors (TFs) find and how efficient they occupy their specific target sites. It is well known that target site search is…
Strong experimental and theoretical evidence shows that transcription factors and other specific DNA-binding proteins find their sites using a two-mode search: alternating between 3D diffusion through the cell and 1D sliding along the DNA.…
To regulate a particular gene, a transcription factor (TF) needs to bind a specific genome location. How is this genome address specified amid the presence of ~10^6-10^9 decoy sites? Our analysis of 319 known TF binding motifs clearly…
Cells integrate signals and make decisions about their future state in short amounts of time. A lot of theoretical effort has gone into asking how to best design gene regulatory circuits that fulfill a given function, yet little is known…
Transcription factors (TFs) exert their regulatory action by binding to DNA with specific sequence preferences. However, different TFs can partially share their binding sequences due to their common evolutionary origin. This `redundancy' of…
Bacterial plant pathogens rely on a battalion of transcription factors to fine-tune their response to changing environmental conditions and marshal the genetic resources required for successful pathogenesis. Prediction of transcription…
Conformational fluctuations are believed to play an important role in the process by which transcription factor proteins locate and bind their target site on the genome of a bacterium. Using a simple model, we show that the binding time can…
We present Brownian dynamics simulations of the facilitated diffusion of a protein, modelled as a sphere with a binding site on its surface, along DNA, modelled as a semi-flexible polymer. We consider both the effect of DNA organisation in…
There is now a certain consensus that Transcription Factors (TFs) reach their target sites, where they regulate gene transcription, via a mechanism dubbed facilitated diffusion (FD). In FD, the TF cycles between events of 3D-diffusion in…