Regulation and Transcription

• Multicellular organisms: Every cell has same genome and information to code for every protein that an organism needs, many cells are specialised, so don’t need every protein and it would waste energy to transcribe and translate all genes
• So some genes are always translated (constituent proteins and respiration enzymes) and others only when required (e.g. inducible proteins and enzymes); genes can be switched on and off (gene regulation)
• Gene regulation is controlled at 3 points: Transcription (during mRNA production), post-transcription (after mRNA production), and post-translational (after protein production)