The CRS eKINDS research initiative: Where we have been and where we are headed from here

The eKINDS research initiative began in 2016 in an effort to accelerate research on numerous outstanding questions related the diversification and speciation of plants and animals. The research encompasses three broad topics: a) identification of created kinds, b) identification of mechanisms that drive diversification and speciation within created kinds, and c) detailed analysis of individual created kinds in an attempt to propose a robust natural history that delineates key events as organisms reproduced and filled the earth following the time of the Flood. As part of the eKINDS project, a new statistical tool is being developed to take advantage of the steadily increasing pools of molecular data. It compares expressed proteins, which typically cluster organisms into discreet groups, suggesting that members of a group may belong to a single kind. This method has been applied to insects and fungi. Additionally, analysis has begun on primates and other vertebrates. There are plans to use it on more taxa as proteomic data accumulates. The eKINDS project is also investigating the possibility that designed mechanisms exist for the generation of adaptive alleles. Some work has been done to explore the significance of founding events in post-Flood diversification and speciation. Other mechanisms are slated to be explored as well. Several avian kinds are being investigated in an attempt to piece together key aspects of their natural history. Our hope is that, by God’s grace, more researchers will be mobilized to address these critical questions so we, as believers, can make substantial contributions to science and demonstrate the robustness of the biblical creation model