Transcription factor binding in Drosophila Distinct developmental fates in Drosophila melanogaster are specified by quantitative differences in transcription factor occupancy on a common set of bound regions.
Abstract Background: We previously established that six sequence-specific transcription factors that initiate anterior/ posterior patterning in Drosophila bind to overlapping sets of thousands of genomic regions in blastoderm embryos. While regions bound at high levels include known and probable functional targets, more poorly bound regions are preferentially associated with housekeeping genes and/or genes not transcribed in the blastoderm, and are frequently found in protein coding sequences or in less conserved non-coding DNA, suggesting that many are likely non-functional.