English: The chromosomal DNA within the nucleoid is segregated into independent supercoiled topological domains A. An illustration of a single topological domain of a supercoiled DNA. A single double-stranded cut anywhere would be sufficient to relax the supercoiling tension of the entire domain. B. An illustration of multiple topological domains in a supercoiled DNA molecule. A presence of supercoiling-diffusion barriers segregates a supercoiled DNA molecule into multiple topological domains. Hypothetical supercoiling diffusion barriers are represented as green spheres. As a result, a single double-stranded cut will only relax one topological domain and not the others. Plectonemic supercoils of DNA within the E. coli nucleoid are organized into several topological domains, but only four domains with a different number of supercoils are shown for simplicity.