Edward & Bella Argued About It
DNA or HOW DO WE GET YOU AND ME?
Since I’m a science fiction writer, I naturally like science. Duh! I’ve always been fascinated by the intricacy of DNA. Most people know about mitosis from 8th grade bio or even from Edward and Bella arguing about it in the first Twilight movie: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V98p610qJC0
But DNA has to do with meiosis, not mitosis. Mitosis is how you make more of the same skin cells after you slice off half your thumb trying to cut a bagel in half.
Meiosis is is all about genetic variation. How do you get kids who look different from their parents instead of kid clones? The answer is sex cells. Egg and sperm.
If we were clones like bacteria, one dose of an antibiotic would wipe most, if not all, of us out. Or if we were clones, one pandemic would do us in. That’s why genetic variation is so important. So how does meiosis go about this fantastic genetic variation that keeps the human race going strong? It involves shuffling the genetic deck not once—but twice.
The first phase is called recombination. Somehow Mom’s and Dad’s 22 chromosomes in the egg and 22 chromosomes in the sperm know how to pair up with their twin. Chromosome 7 from Mom meets and pairs up with chromosome 7 from Dad.
Then this intricate dance begins. And I mean intricate! The chromosomes chop out pieces of themselves and exchange these exact pieces with each other. All of this is incredibly orderly and the result? Lots of genetic diversity. 1
But how do chromosomes know how to do this? Well, there’s this Designer called God. That’s not a cop-out. Nothing in our world is complex enough to explain how DNA works. In fact, the more we learn about DNA, the less we understand it.
Science writers like to compare the genome to a textbook . . . that conveys the fact that it stores information, but glosses over its buzzing, dynamic nature – proteins docking on and off to control the activity of genes huge stretches of DNA that fold and unfold to reveal or hide their sequences
parasitic jumping genes that copy themselves and hop throughout the genome...
“None of our information stores – not sheet music, not recipe books – are this intricate.” 2
Call to Me and I will answer you, and I will tell you great and mighty things, which you do not know. (Jeremiah 33:3 NASB)
God thunders wondrously with His voice; He does great things that we cannot comprehend. (Job 37:5 ESV)
But all this shuffling isn’t finished. Next comes independent assortment. The matched-up chromosomes get pulled apart. There’s a 50% of ending up with one or the other of these newly sliced and diced chromosomes in the egg or sperm. More genetic diversity! This is why kids from the same family look different from each other and from their parents.
And you know what else? God loves this variation stuff! He could have made one species of bird. But He made 10,000. He made 17,500 different species of butterflies. He made more than 30,00 varieties of roses. But people are pretty special to Him. He made only one of each of us.
SELAH AWARD FINALIST!
Shout out to the original Lady Lits! Good Tidings: A Christmas Anthology won third place at the Selah Awards for anthologies this year at the ! Our very own Lady Lit Susan Marie Graham traveled to the Blue Ridge Mountain Christian Writer’s Conference in Ridgecrest, North Carolina to accept the award on everyone’s behalf.
The e-book is half price at $2.99 and print copies are a dollar off at $13.99. All July proceedes are donated to the Lady Lits' favorite Christian-based charities.
FEATURED LADY LIT
Susan Marie Graham writes stories that explore the Christian experience, in both historical and contemporary settings. Her interest in vintage movies and World War II inspired her first novel, There Will Your Heart Be.
Susan has been writing since she was ten, but never thought of it as a career until she quit her corporate job and moved with her husband alongside the great Smoky Mountains in Tennessee. She is currently working on a fiction series based on the biblical Fruit of the Spirit, with the first three books to be released in 2024.
Keep up with her progress at susanmariegraham.com
PICTURES FROM THE GARDEN
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Here’s the link: https://www.cynthiazagergodwin.com/my-blog
Want more info about the complexity of DNA? https://biobeat.nigms.nih.gov/2016/03/four-ways-inheritance-is-more-complex-than-mendel-knew/
Acts and Facts: Genetic Recombination, A Regulated and Designed Chromosomal System. July/August 2023. Vol.53, No. 4.
2. Ed Yong, Will we ever… reveal all the secrets of life from DNA?, Future, bbc.com, November 2012.
DNA photo: Gerd Altmann, Pixabay.com
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