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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2019 Oct 25.
Published in final edited form as: Wiley Interdiscip Rev Syst Biol Med. 2018 Apr 25;10(5):e1423. doi: 10.1002/wsbm.1423

Figure 3. Possible effects of cis- and trans- changes to gene regulatory networks.

Figure 3

(a) Cis-regulatory mutations to TF binding sites can add or remove genes from a TF’s regulon. (b) Changes to the specificity of trans-acting TFs can rewire the genes regulated by the TF. (c) Gain of co-factor interactions can recruit a TF to newly regulated genes, stabilizing interactions with low affinity binding sites. (d) Cis-regulatory sequences and TFs can co-evolve to maintain the same regulatory logic. (e) TFs can gain new regulatory domains, or interactions with co-factors with regulatory domains, changing the expression of the genes under their control. The arrows denote potentially multiple evolutionary steps.