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Attenuation is a regulatory feature found throughout Archaea and Bacteria causing premature termination of transcription. Attenuators are 5'-cis acting regulatory regions which fold into one of two alternative RNA structures which determine the success of transcription. The folding is modulated by a sensing mechanism (see ) producing either a Rho-independent terminator, resulting in interrupted transcription and a non-functional RNA product; or an anti-terminator structure, resulting in a functional RNA transcript. Transcription attenuation is prevalent in many bacterial species providing fast and sensitive regulation of gene operons and is commonly used to repress genes in the presence of their own product (or a downstream metabolite).

Section 1
Attenuation was first observed by Charles Yanofsky in the trp operon of E. coli.

Section 2
Attenuator (genetics) or attenuator

Section 3
See prev sec