The chromodomains of CHD1 are critical for enzymatic activity but less important for chromatin localization.

The molecular motor protein CHD1 has been implicated in the regulation of transcription and in the transcription-independent genome-wide incorporation of H3.3 into paternal chromatin in Drosophila melanogaster. A key feature of CHD1 is the presence of two chromodomains, which can bind to histone H3 methylated at lysine 4 and thus might serve to recruit and/or maintain CHD1 at the chromatin.