The ability of enhancers to activate imprinted genes is dependent on the presence of an insulator on the unmethylated allele between the two genes. An example of this is the Igf2-H19 imprinted locus. In this locus the CTCF protein regulates imprinted expression by binding to the unmethylated maternal imprinted control region (ICR) but not on the paternal ICR. When bound to the unmethylated maternal sequence, CTCF effectively blocks downstream enhancer elements from interacting with the Igf2 gene promoter, leaving only the H19 gene to be expressed.