Aviva Systems Biology manufactures over 3,000 antibodies for transcription factor research. These proteins have become an important tool for research associated with gene regulation. Transcription regulators control the rate and timing of gene transcription in a cell. A number of proteins govern this fundamental process by various mechanisms. Transcription factors can bind to promoter or enhancer regions of DNA and serve to promote or impede gene transcription. These bound transcription factors may be classified as activators or repressors. Activators aid in the recruitment of RNA polymerase to a given promoter region, thereby ‘activating’ the transcription process. The level of transcription may be enhanced by binding of proteins to specific regions of DNA known as enhancers. These regions are important in the control of gene expression levels, although they need not be near the target gene to function^[1]. Repressors bind to areas of DNA (known as operators) that are close to promoters and act to block the function of RNA polymerase and thus inhibit the transcription process. The binding affinity of repressors can be altered by inducers, which promote transcription, and corepressors, which further repress transcription. Other proteins, such as Histone Deacetylases (HDACs), can modify the accessibility of DNA to transcriptional machinery and thus serve as regulators transcription regulators.

1. Spilianakis CG et al. 2005. Interchromosomal associations between alternatively expressed loci. Nature. Jun 2;435(7042):637-45.