Genetic Variability by Design
by Chris Ashcraft M.S., M.Ed. MTMS
Description:
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.
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