The domain is highly conserved among both plants and animals, and is represented in a large number of different proteins in many genomes, such as that of the mouse.

Some chromodomain-containing genes have multiple alternative splicing isoforms that omit the chromodomain entirely.

[3] In mammals, chromodomain-containing proteins are responsible for aspects of gene regulation related to chromatin remodeling and formation of heterochromatin regions.

[4] Chromodomain-containing proteins also bind methylated histones[5][6] and appear in the RNA-induced transcriptional silencing complex.

They function by identifying and binding to methylated lysine residues that exist on the surface of chromatin proteins and thereby regulate gene transcription.