Rho-dependent termination is a specific bacterial mechanism, which plays a major role in gene expression and maintenance of genomic integrity. This is an important mechanism for the fast adaptation of bacteria to environmental changes or stresses. Although Rho-dependent termination sites are very diverse and without a real consensus sequence, CBM researchers have identified dozens of quantitative sequence descriptors (eg% C and% G) that, taken collectively, provide good prediction of the sites of Rho action in the model genomes of Escherichia coli and Salmonella (85% success rate).

This work was published in the journal Nucleic Acids Research.