Commonly studied regulons in bacteria are those involved in response to stress such as heat shock. The heat shock response in E. coli is regulated by the sigma factor 
σ32 (RpoH), whose regulon has been characterized as containing at least 89 open reading frames.
Regulons involving virulence factors in pathogenic bacteria are of particular research interest; an often-studied example is the phosphate regulon in E. coli, which couples phosphate homeostasis to pathogenicity through a two-component system. Regulons can sometimes be pathogenicity islands.
The Ada regulon in E. coli is a well-characterized example of a group of genes involved in the adaptive response form of DNA repair.
Quorum sensing behavior in bacteria is a commonly cited example of a modulon or stimulon, though some sources describe this type of intercellular auto-induction as a separate form of regulation.