The principle of independent assortment, also known as Mendels third law, describes how different genes independently separate from one another when reproductive cells develop. During meiosis, the pairs of homologous chromosomes are divided in half to form haploid cells, and this separation, or assortment, of homologous chromosomes is random. This means that all of the maternal chromosomes will not be separated into one cell, while all paternal chromosomes are separated into another. Instead, after meiosis occurs, each haploid cell contains a mixture of genes from the organisms mother and father. Another feature of independent assortment is recombination, which occurs during meiosis and is a process that breaks and recombines pieces of DNA to produce new combinations of genes. Recombination scrambles pieces of maternal and paternal genes, which ensures that genes assort independently from one another. The law of independent assortment states that the random orientation of homologous chromosome pairs during metaphase I allows for the production of gametes with many different assortments of homologous chromosomes. Independent assortment is important for creating genomic diversity in a species, and it accomplishes this primarily through two processes: independent assortment and crossing over (recombination) .