Genetic Variability by Design - Chris Ashcraft

New alleles are accumulating rapidly in living populations and cellular mechanisms have not been adequately sought to explain the intentional production of these changes. Homologous DNA recombination occurs in all organisms and is at the heart of genetics. Since its discovery during meiosis, these reactions were assumed to occur randomly along the length of chromosomes, and only involved with gene crossovers. It is now well known that meiotic recombination is not the random process it was originally assumed to be, and controlled by highly organized regulatory systems. In addition, a form of homologous recombination has been discovered which is responsible for creating diversity in variable genes, and was recently linked to single base-pair substitutions in immunoglobulins. New allele formation may indeed be the key to explaining the rapid production of distinct breeds, but their presence in the genome has been assumed the result of random mutations. Therefore, the ability of the cell to purposefully edit genes requires evaluation.


This video is a 64 minute seminar recorded by the Design Science Association in Portland, OR July 2003. The presentation is based on a research paper of the same title.

Genetic Variability by Design: Journal of Creation 18(2) 2004
(Read the full technical review article)

View PowerPoint file online

About the Speaker:

Christopher Wayne Ashcraft, M.S., M.Ed. is a creation scientist, speaker, and educator. He obtained the Bachelor of Science in biology from Wayland Baptist University in 1989, a Master of Science in biology from Texas Tech University in 1996, and a Master of Education from the University of Washington in 2008.

Chris was a research technician for 12 years specialized in plant tissue culture and genetic transformation technology, and is now a high school science teacher at North Sound Christian School where he teaches Biology, Chemistry, and Creation Apologetics.

He moved from research into teaching in response to a call from God to work in creation science missions. He is firmly committed to researching and teaching creation apologetics and speaks periodically at churches, schools, and creation organizations in the Northwest United States. He is the founder of the Northwest Creation Network and the CreationWiki internet encyclopedia where he serves as senior administrator. He also organizes the Seattle Creation Conference.