Figure 1.

Principles contributing to DNA target recognition and binding by proteins. (a) Schematic illustration representing the DNA-binding continuum, the boundaries of which are defined by hypothetical examples of “structure interactor” or “sequence interactor”; real proteins are expected to fall somewhere in the continuum flanked by these two extremes. (b) Examples of hypothetical encounter landscapes: (left) protein whose binding behavior is dominated by DNA structure, and (right) protein whose target recognition properties are dominated by DNA sequence. (c) Binding landscape describes the stability of protein–DNA complexes along a defined DNA sequence.