Shaping Animal Science: From Rural Upbringing to Groundbreaking Discoveries with Dr. Ken White- VP USU Extension, Dean CAAS and Utah Agricultural Experiment Station

A college athlete with a rural upbringing becomes one of the key craftsmen in shaping animal science and agriculture. Join us in this riveting conversation with Dr. Ken White, a pioneer in animal medicine and a leader at Utah State University. Hear his journey from a football scholarship to carving new paths in the world of animal science. Discover how his tireless dedication and passion have led to the development of vital programs at Utah State University such as the 'two plus two' and the newly launched College of Veterinary Medicine.

Ever wondered how research can lead to groundbreaking discoveries in agriculture? In this episode, we journey through the fascinating world of cloning research with Dr. White. Revisiting his Eureka moment that led to the first successful cloning of a mule, underscoring the power of persistence, the beauty of unexpected outcomes, and the essential role of research. 

Finally, we explore the immense value of life and shared experiences. Dr. White reflects on his upbringing, the support of his family, and how these factors played a pivotal role in his journey in research. We also delve into the transformative power of mentorship and research in agriculture. So, join us as we celebrate the undeniably significant role of farmers, ranchers, and all those who contribute to our society.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:16

Hey everybody, this is Ethan Gillum with Utah State University Extension, down here in Seviere County, utah. I'm your host on Echoes of the Land Tradition, agriculture, livestock and Expertise. This week we have the VP of Extension for Utah State University, dr Ken White, on with us. Stick around. You are going to hear some awesome, interesting stories from someone who has been integral in shaping our program into what it is today. All right, everybody. So you know, the purpose of this podcast is to connect you with experts, and not only experts in ag, but also the people that are kind of leading the charge and steering the ship, and that's what we're doing today. We've brought in someone pretty special for our program. He's done a lot in our field, but I'll let him introduce himself and then we tell everyone what you do for the college and what you're in charge of, just so they can get an idea.

Speaker 2: 1:14

Sure be happy to. I'm Ken White. I've been at Utah State University since 1991. Prior to that I was on the faculty at Louisiana State University. I currently am the vice president for USU Extension, so I oversee all of the Extension programs throughout the state of Utah. I'm also the dean of the College of Agriculture and Applied Sciences. I oversee all the academic programs in that college. And then my third hat is that I'm the director of the Utah Agricultural Experiment Station, which means we receive federal monies they oftentimes refer to as hatch dollars or multi-regional project dollars that come in and those dollars are committed to faculty salaries on faculty that do research, and primarily in agriculture and natural resources, but also family and community. We have dollars that impact every college on campus except two.

Speaker 1: 2:26

I've been asked this a couple of times what's the difference between the Ag Experiment Station and what Extension does?

Speaker 2: 2:33

Yeah, ag Experiment Station really focuses strictly 100% on research. Research can be basic in nature or it could be applied in nature. It's not necessarily totally independent. We have Extension faculty that also have research appointments and so in some cases those are primarily faculty that are in academic units on campus that have high Extension assignments. So Extension is more the community-based programs, the non-degree education programs in the state that are designed to meet community needs. And also, I think an important thing to keep in mind with the Experiment Station is that all of that research is supposed to be applicable, to impact in a positive way or answer important questions for agriculture, natural resources, relationships, financial issues, all those things that really impact people throughout the state of Utah.

Speaker 1: 3:52

You're spread out, I'm spread out.

Speaker 2: 3:55

I put a lot of miles on my truck.

Speaker 1: 3:58

So you, as I mean, where do you think most of your time is demanded right now? I mean, I know the college probably sends you everywhere. You send yourself everywhere overseeing a lot, but as far as needs of the college now we've gone through a transition, kind of in a new phase now, and the ag industry is always changing. Where do you see a lot of your time being spent?

Speaker 2: 4:26

Yeah, to be honest, it's really split probably the most between Extension and the college efforts. I have administrative duties with the Experiment Station but once we make those commitments of research dollars they either go to help fund faculty positions or a small operating budgets or research budgets. That mainly. I respond to any issues that need to be problems that need to be solved or fireman Fireman.

Speaker 2: 5:06

I'm not going to put things out, but with the college and an extension, there are always issues that are coming up, emerging issues in the state that need to be addressed within communities, and we move resources around a little bit, but we're always trying to stay on top and ahead of what the next emerging.

Speaker 2: 5:26

I'll give you an example. When I first was appointed to this position in 2013, one of the things that I immediately began to realize was that the state of East job for no fault of anybody, but it appeared that we were having some issues and problems with opioids and the dependency in the state. I had set aside again because of some retirements and you'll understand that when we have people retire, they have a salary that's larger than what we need to bring on a new faculty member. Because of the difference in salary ranges, I had accumulated some salary dollars. I did an analysis with a person at the University of Utah who was in public medicine at the time he's since left along with the health department and identified the nine counties that seem to have the biggest issues. I redirected those dollars to create five new extension positions that I assigned to those nine counties throughout the state of Utah.

Speaker 2: 6:58

We're not in a position to be able to do that often, but in that case it was really an important issue that we get in front of. Since that time, those positions have been responsible for bringing millions and millions of dollars into the state of Utah to help develop programming, help with programs such as training people on how to use Naloxol and all those types of things, and as well as partnering some of the community resources that are available for families and individuals that have those issues.

Speaker 1: 7:35

Well, I've seen those. Even with the short time that I've been here, I've seen those programs. There's one coming up here directly in extension there's an opioid rancher workshop. I believe it's here in just a week or two. It's coming up directly.

Speaker 2: 7:54

Exactly. I think. The one thing that I think is important for people to understand is USU Extension is a great partner. We don't necessarily always have all the resources to be able to meet every need, but we partner with people who can help us address some of these. One of the things that's been really brought to the forefront of my mind is mental health issues. We've partnered with the Utah Department of Agriculture and Food on a mental health program that has provided funding for farmers and ranchers. That's your background. I have come from that area. In my family as well. There are people that have a lot of pride and it's a very difficult thing sometimes for them to admit that they're having problems.

Speaker 2: 8:55

Last I saw, this program is committed about, I think, close to over $200,000 in getting some of the farmers and ranchers access to therapists that can help, counselors that can visit with them and talk through some of these issues and help give them some tools to be able to address. I tell people that I meet I don't know that there's an industry that has more risk and gamble than being a farmer.

Speaker 2: 9:24

Being a farmer or rancher, you can't count on almost anything and everything's variable and you basically have no control over the weather, the amount of water, nothing, prices, and so it's understandable that that's a high anxiety, high stress career. It obviously has some fantastic benefits, but that's just a couple of examples of areas where we've tried to partner with people to address really some important problems. It's not a group of people again, this will ring true, I think, when I say it but it's not a group of people that will sit around and complain to people about some of the issues that they face. You respect that, but you also understand that sometimes you've got to reach out a little differently to be able to provide a hand of help.

Speaker 1: 10:24

I think we see the importance. I mean, we obviously see the importance of how much we depend on those people as a nation and how much we really rely on them being able to get up every morning and face whatever's thrown their way to get that commodity pushed through the system.

Speaker 2: 10:44

Absolutely. They're really the unsung heroes. I mean, covid brought that to the forefront of most people. Unfortunately, there's a declining percentage of people in the country that actually have any relationship to agriculture production. There's a higher percentage, growing percentage, that really don't understand everything that goes into providing that food that's available in the shelves of the local supermarket or farmer's market or what have you. And when COVID hit and packing facilities, processing facilities shut down, I mean, even this past summer when we had avian influenza hit our state, how long did it take before Oakdale and some of those places closed down? Before you couldn't get any eggs, or if you could, they were $6 and $7 a dozen.

Speaker 1: 11:40

They learn very quickly how short that is.

Speaker 2: 11:44

It's a very vulnerable supply chain and those folks are dependent on a lot of other people and resources to be able to make it happen.

Speaker 2: 11:56

Yeah, it's a very vulnerable supply chain and that we need to in some ways rethink and figure out local processing facilities, make things a little more available and even provide some of our farmers and ranchers with the opportunity to do a lot more direct marketing to their end customers. Not only reinforces the public these days really wants to know a lot more about where their food comes from and the associated safety of it and also, I think, from our producer's standpoint, it gives them an opportunity to capture more of that total end of the road revenue for the products that, frankly, they put in the majority the energy they take the majority the risk and oftentimes, in the current model, they get the least amount. Yeah, so I think some of the things as we move forward we need to really rethink and build supply chains that allow a more secure supply chain, as well as one that allows the person who is invested the most to be able to receive the largest percentage of the compensation.

Speaker 1: 13:18

Well, that's how we would keep them alive, hopefully Correct. I mean, I think the dairies are a perfect example of that, where you talk about most of the processing, I mean they take it almost to the end. And if folks knew in the United States alone, you know how short our milk supply is. You know, um, and and milk's not only in a jug.

Speaker 2: 13:42

No, absolutely.

Speaker 1: 13:43

And if that shuts down for a day, that the what it would do to the nation is just I don't think I mean.

Speaker 2: 13:50

I don't think you're absolutely right. I don't think people realize the fantastic protein source that is for most Americans, and you know you're talking not only the liquid milk, but yogurts, cheese, cottage cheese, I mean you name it, all of it. It's all involved in that milk and um and it's a and. As I said, there's very few protein sources there is economical as milk and milk products, so it's very important.

Speaker 1: 14:20

Yeah, aside of that, there's very well prepared people in extension. There's people that come from these backgrounds, that have educated, themselves, been educated and now are trying to pay it back. And that's the way I see extension is. It's a really good job to be able to pay back absolutely those communities, absolutely.

Speaker 2: 14:37

I mean I tell potential uh extension candidates uh for our positions, as well as um students that are considering it that extension is really a very rewarding, it's very demanding and it's and it's a very it's a high energy uh job. It's one that takes a lot of stamina because you know uh being a faculty member out in the community, oftentimes you're on the job, whether you know it or not, every day and um, but what the other side of that coin that goes with that is that it's it. There are very few jobs where you can see an immediate return on the investment of your time and energy, and it's extremely rewarding to be able to provide information to somebody who uses it and and betters their lives, as well as their family, almost immediately. And so it's it's really a tremendous uh career and it's um a very rewarding career for anybody that's that's interested in in being someone who really has a life and a career of public service and and making an impact in the community.

Speaker 1: 15:54

And I think you know the perfect example is last night and I told you, I got, um, I got pulled over last night by one of the county county cops and he, um, we got to talk in because thankfully I wasn't in too much trouble and and he said, well, who are you? Where are you from? Are you from Logan? I said, well, yeah, but I moved down here and I, you know, I'm the new ag extension agent. He said, oh, really, so you took over for for the previous one?

Speaker 1: 16:19

And I said yeah, and he said man, he said him and his wife worked their butts off for 30 years down here, I mean, and he knew exactly who they were. He was a producer himself and he's, and he just had nothing but good things to say. Awesome Cause, cause he saw, you know, and I guess that maybe they don't realize that, but you know, here's a guy I wouldn't even know he was a producer and he's, and he's singing the accolades of what these people have done, because it was their, their investment in life, it was their reward, and people noticed that.

Speaker 2: 16:52

Absolutely Very helpful in the community and that's really rewarding to hear those types of stories.

Speaker 1: 16:57

Where you're at right now is you know when, when you, when you started your college career and and maybe it'll help if you give us just a little bit of background on on your upbringing, um and so a multifaceted question. But you know where you came from, how you started life and and what you decided to study. Is this where you saw yourself wanting to be what you're doing now? Yeah, I'm not sure.

Speaker 2: 17:24

I don't think. No, I'm totally honest. No, I never would have imagined that I'm in the position I'm in today. Um, yeah, I was. I was born and raised in in the Bay Area of California. At that time, uh, the community I was from was extremely rural. Today it's, you know, you would consider it urban. Um, you know, my parents uh, wanted to live out and and have that type of of lifestyle and we had a very small dairy my, my, actually my brother showed Jersey cows and we had the California grant at Grand Champion. Uh, dairy Cow, yeah, jersey Dairy Cow, and um, and, and so I was always grown up, raised and and grew up with animals. Um, you know, it wasn't very long in my lifetime when, um, which is a kind of a familiar story out in this part of California where we kind of got enclosed by a bunch of houses and and my parents had to, had to sell things off and and I think from that early upbringing I felt really compelled to that.

Speaker 2: 18:43

I, you know passion for raising animals and and and originally, uh, I I went off to school. I actually was a, uh, intercollegiate student athlete, I played football, and that's how I was able to get my undergraduate degree is I. I went to school on a, on a football scholarship and um, and during that process I settled into animal science as my, my bachelor's degree and, you know, not too long into my college football playing career, I realized, you know, I probably need to spend a little bit more time in books and academics, um, and and so I remember the last couple of years of my academic program. There was a new technology that, at that time, was like cutting edge state of the art and, and it was uh embryo transfer. And I thought it was so amazing that you could take uh, a really high quality uh female animal, and uh treat her in a way that uh, that cow would would produce multiple embryos. You could recover them from her and then you could transfer each one of those embryos to a surrogate animal and thereby produce a larger number of high quality offspring.

Speaker 2: 20:12

And so, based on that conversation, I went to my uh, my the faculty member, uh, who was reproductive biologist, and asked him you know where would be the the best place to go to cause, and I guess I should also feel feel in the gap that I had applied uh to veterinary school and and because I was still a California resident, although I was living in Utah, uh, going to school, uh, my inner graduate in Utah, the only school I could apply to was university college at Fort New Davis and it it was at the time, and continues to be, a highly sought after that school, highly competitive.

Speaker 2: 20:59

And you know, with my grades, having played football and I still I had a pretty good uh grade point average, but not sufficient. You know, you were you're looking at 4.0s and 3.9s and stuff and and I was a few notches below that, so I didn't get accepted. So I had this conversation with my reproduction uh professor to say, well, if I want to learn about this, um, where was the best place I could go to learn about? And and he, he mentioned a program at Colorado state and but he also said, if you really want to the guy that I've heard of the most and has really, uh, outstanding reputation and embryology you want to go to university, california davis, which was great place is the same place.

Speaker 2: 21:52

So I applied, I was accepted, and I Want to davis and earn the master's degree in animal science, thinking that when I finish my master's degree I would go ahead and apply to veterinary school and I would have a much better chance of getting in the veterinary school.

Speaker 2: 22:09

Well, within that two years while I was working master's degree I got so enthused about the research and you know, again, it's one of those passions, I think, that students sometimes they can't predict, but you get just get Sucked in to the idea and it was so remarkable to be able to look at those embryos and and be able to realize that that time we were splitting embryos and half to make twins and everything was really so cool and that would eventually develop into a full groom Cav.

Speaker 2: 22:47

And so I decided I, you know I'd set the I and I also interacted with Veterinarians that were going to school and stuff, and and I thought, okay, I'm actually having a lot of fun doing this research thing. And so I decided. Then I stayed at davis for another four years and and and and completed my, my doctorate and systemic physiology with a focus in reproduction and embryology, and and I became finished up and my first faculty position was an assistant professor professor at louisiana state university. I got the job offer and I and I well, for before the interview I had to go and look on a map to figure out where was that yeah?

Speaker 2: 23:39

and and so we we got the job moved down there and Really had a fantastic experience down in baton Rouge and look, south east louisiana in general was just. We made some wonderful lifelong friends that I still that's saying and sending, I still keep in contact with. But it also launched my career in a big way and I started getting federal grants to do research and and then A job opening came open and keep opening at us, you and a couple other places. I applied for him, interviewed for all three of those positions and then, having been exposed to the beauty of utah state university, when I got the offer from us you, I jumped on it, immediately accepted it and Moved up there, but I never. So that's how I got here and I always and I'm a researcher, lab rat and I've always done research.

Speaker 2: 24:48

I've done research in horses, I've done research in when I was at lsu, some swine embryo research, sheep and goat research and and certainly might my go to has always been cattle research, but there and and and beef cattle reproduction and embryo embryology.

Speaker 2: 25:13

But I yeah, I kind of about I guess was 2008 we had a department had that unfortunately Got pancreatic cancer and the animal there in veterinary sciences department at us. You and he passed away and I and the department, the college did a national search for a new head and I had three or four my colleagues in the department that said you know, you really should Put your hat and we need somebody that can, you know, lead us and can take us where we need to go. And so I applied and was Selected to be the department head in 2008 and really I had always felt like that I would be a researcher. I didn't want and I never looked to be an administrator and it's, you know, the joke on campuses. You know you make the decision to go to the dark side yeah, exactly when you do that yeah and and yet I guess, when I couple, opportunities created themselves.

Speaker 2: 26:28

One was that I had the chance to. You know, a lot of students went through my reproduction class. I taught the, the upper division, animal reproduction, and it was a required course, and a lot of those kids were planning on going to vet school and they were, you tell, residents and a lot of fantastic students I felt like, based on my interaction with them in the in the class, would make excellent veterinarians and they either wouldn't get accepted because the low numbers available seats or, if they got accepted, they had to go out of state and pay, you know, upwards of $80,000 a year, you know, to get their education you do the math for years of $80,000. That's a huge oh yeah. So the opportunity to present it as itself, and I had a lot of conversations with legislators in the state of Utah and we were able to develop a model that established a partnership between ourselves and Washington state university, and that's when we created the school of.

Speaker 2: 27:42

At the time, and I think it was about 2011 week, we see we took on our first class of students in the US you school of veterinary medicine and the students would come to us.

Speaker 2: 27:56

You spend the first two years At in in Logan, at us, you in the in the veterinary DVM, dr veterinary medicine curriculum, and then, after those first two years, they would transfer up to pulmon and finish their last two years in pulmon, washington and Washington state university, and it created 30 new slots. That school of veterinary medicine had 30 seats that were available to students 20 from Utah and at least 10 from, you know, non resident students, and, and that was just an eye opening experience for me that helped me realize the type of an impact that a good administrator could have, not only on the department in the short run, but in the whole community, in almost in generational impacts on On society. And so you know that's one of our person who held my position, was appointed to be the provost and, like you know, the positions opened up another national search and I was Selected in 2013 to my current position. So, and then since that time, we've created that two plus two is now trans, is now in the process of transforming to a Four year independent back in school.

Speaker 1: 29:32

That you know, there, you yeah, so yeah, chapter two was to.

Speaker 2: 29:38

We developed a program full brought, developed a plan to be able to transition to two plus two into a four year and and the state legislature was gracious enough our legislators realized that was an important need for Utah to be able to have access to the quality animal health care that's necessary for agriculture to expand in Utah and I believe it was in the. The state legislature was very much in the process of creating a four year independent. So we're going to have eventually we'll have 80 seats in that college, veterinary medicine. It's now it, when it's when it's fully functional, which we're hoping, that the first students will come in and That'll be spun out as an. It's currently an independent college. It's out from underneath my college and they have a new dean of that college, doctor derk van der Waal, who just by chance, I've I've been Derk's a personal friend.

Speaker 2: 30:59

I actually hired him as oh really in the 80 vs department from the University of Pennsylvania vet school when we created the two plus two. I had known him derk was one of my collaborators when we did the mule cloning project in the early 2000s and so he'll be a fantastic I think he's going to be a fantastic dean of the college of veterinary medicine at USU.

Speaker 1: 31:26

I thought of a couple things while you were talking about that development and you know my and you know I'm obviously, but my direct boss has told me his experience because he was in your reproduction class and just so the folks understand of the quality of personnel that are in agriculture and working for the college my boss, the director of ag and natural resources, said that was one of his hardest classes he ever took at Utah State. You know, but that's, that's quality and that's that's a good thing. When Utah State came up actually my wife is the one who suggested Utah State for the master's program Utah State itself is extremely recognized in the nation as an agricultural. It is it is.

Speaker 2: 32:14

I'm not sure that I'm not sure that Utahns in general understand the high quality education and the respect that some of the programs that Utah State have nationally and worldwide. And you're right, our, some of our agriculture programs are frankly right up there, the best in the country. And I think our they're just again, people in Utah need to be, you know, hold her head high because we're frankly second to none. And you know, the students that come up, I know, and the and I'll just speak for my college, but I know this is true and most, if not all, of the colleges on on USU campus.

Speaker 2: 33:07

But you know, I expect our faculty to give all of our just as I did in that reproduction class when I taught it I expect them to give the students, our students, that the top, best quality education, give those students everything that they need as far as information and learning to be successful in their chosen careers.

Speaker 2: 33:31

And and we have faculty, they're committed to that and we'll spend the time and energy necessary to be able to train that and teach that next generation of student that can. You know, I think a faculty member, a good faculty member, is always looking that every student that they teach has the potential to be their replacement, and so I think it brings it a little bit home and personalizes it. If, when you're, when you have students in your class, and you look at every one of those students and you say sorry, I think which one of you is going to be my replacement, I make darn sure you actually already and actually better prepared than what I was when I, when I started my career. And and I think that's that we deliver that to our students at Utah State University and and that's the expectation, and I hope that people throughout the state of Utah appreciate the fact that they have that level of quality access to that level of quality education right here in Utah.

Speaker 1: 34:41

Some of this out to me in in the ad, vs and in the ag program was talking to professors. You know, before you go to college and my dad used to say this you know, like they don't care. You know, if you don't show up to class, they don't care. If you know you're on, you're in charge of your own ship. Well, I didn't have that experience at Utah State. They definitely. You know, when you're in a master's program, you're you better get your work done and and you're expected to be able to do homework and and get yourself dressed and all that stuff.

Speaker 1: 35:11

But, um, one that stood out to me and I and I, like I said, all of my professors were excellent, uh, but one of the classes I enjoyed the most was with Dr Rickards and sitting in his class, because it was a class of six and he put us in a little conference room. That's where we would meet and it was a discussion based class and I've never felt like I got such good one on one. You know his office door was always open and you could just tell that he didn't want to walk out of that room until he felt like, do you actually understand? Don't just tell me, yes, Do you understand? And if you don't, let's come back to it. And and we didn't really move on until he felt like um topics were thoroughly covered and sometimes they were extremely thoroughly covered, but there was that's all learned very well.

Speaker 2: 36:01

That's particularly uh rewarding for me to hear that Cause. I don't know if you realize this or not, but actually Dr Rickards was a was a PhD, one of my PhD students when.

Speaker 1: 36:12

I was at LSU. Yeah, that's right.

Speaker 2: 36:14

He did come from LSU, that's right he finished his PhD, I was his, I was his, his mentor at LSU. He then went on to a faculty position at a medical school in Oklahoma, that's right, and I think, um, it was after uh, I think I don't remember exactly what year he came to USU, but I know he but we. He applied for a position and and was, was selected and probably came to USU in the in the mid nine 1990s probably yeah. He's yeah, he's academically related to me.

Speaker 1: 36:51

Yeah, there you go, like, see and that, and that's the beauty of, that's the beauty of the system, that's the beauty of the especially, in my opinion, the ag world, because I think you make friends on more than just academic. You know um, the academic level, you know you're, you're working with these people, you're in the lab with these people, you're in the field with these people and then seeing their success, I'm assuming, is yeah, I mean particularly in research.

Speaker 2: 37:17

I mean there's there's a lot of failures in research. I mean I've got a. I got a, a sign in in one of my offices that it's a quote from Einstein and it and it I'll paraphrase. It says something like you know if, if, if research was easy, everybody'd be doing it Exactly.

Speaker 2: 37:38

And and that's really true, and I think you know, whenever you get uh in, whether you're a master's student, a PhD, or you're the the, the principal investigator of the research project, you have to realize that there's going to be a lot of failures, and you're you're basically looking for the successes and the experiments. If they're designed uh correctly, they'll give you the right outcome. The outcome may not be what you had expected or planned for, but they give you the right ed. There's an outcome and it's the right one. And then you that leads the next step in in in the research. Yeah, and if you do it that way, then you, you can make conclusions that will withstand the test of time.

Speaker 1: 38:27

And that is, that is the incredible part, especially with the tools that people have that we have at our disposal now, being able to have just a pile of data and go well, that's not what I expected, but wow.

Speaker 2: 38:39

Exactly.

Speaker 1: 38:40

You know, if we got to have a little luck, you got to have a whole lot of perseverance and you got, and you got to show up. You know, and I think some of the at least for me, uh, what I would consider breakthroughs were just due to, you know, sticking in there.

Speaker 2: 38:55

Persistence, yeah, you know, persistence, yep.

Speaker 1: 38:58

And and being able to notice something and and grab onto that, I think, is really what separates a lot of us who, um have come through the Utah program, where we get a lot of rain I think we get a lot of free rain At least I felt like that in the program was, you know, we're, we're expected to, you know, think for ourselves and, um, and through that, if you persevere, you, you can make a lot of headway, um. But but talking about the, you know the perseverance, there was a story you shared in my onboarding and I kind of wanted you to tell that story of the mule cloning. You know, because that is, in my mind, the perfect example of over and over and over again and then solution.

Speaker 2: 39:41

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 39:42

And and people, I don't think, realize that we had Dolly and then we had mules right after that, exactly Not too long after.

Speaker 2: 39:50

No, you're absolutely right. I mean, and it is kind of a I don't tell the story too often because it is such a, it's a favorite, I think in my career. It was a, really a defining milestone in my career and it was because it was really that classical Eureka moment and it and it was based on that, you re reek a moment was preceded by a tremendous amount of work, a tremendous amount of study, a tremendous amount of persistence and a little bit of luck. Uh, huh, yeah, so Dolly was, uh was reported in, if I remember correctly, 1997. And then shortly thereafter the first calves I think there were dairy animals were produced. That was probably in 99, 2000.

Speaker 2: 40:58

Well, I had a visit from a gentleman from the university who was a professor at the university of Idaho, uh, his name was Dr Gordon Wood. Gordon knew me through reputation. I knew him. Gordon had done some of the early work in horses that really defined um, uh, prostagland, and I think it was E, two or prostagland, and E as the signal that uh, the embryo generated Uh to inform the reproductive tract that there was a fertilized horse embryo there and, you know, triggered some other signals that were important for subsequent development. So I knew of him through the literature, but I'm not. I don't remember. I think that was the very first time we actually met and Gordon called me up and asked if he could come visit with me and talk about cloning, because he knew we were doing a lot of it.

Speaker 2: 42:08

I mean, we'd been cloning animals way before that.

Speaker 2: 42:13

I mean when I came to Utah State in 1991, we had been cloning sheep and goats down in Louisiana and using blastomers, which is that's a term that describes a single cell of a develop, early developing embryo, and we were using those cells as a nuclear donor cells.

Speaker 2: 42:34

And uniqueness of Dolly just to make sure everybody's on the same page is that Dolly was the first one, its first animal that was produced from what's referred to as a somatic cell, which means a totally differentiated cell, something that is well beyond embryonic. It came from an adult animal which that was the unique part of it was completely differentiated. So we were cloning cattle at that time and doing research and I actually at that point in my career I was actually the guy that did all the nuclear transfers. I sat at the microscope and I enucleated the oocytes and I transferred the nucleus, or the cellular, the somatic cell nucleus into the oocyte and we activated them and all that. So I was actually at the microscope where Gordon showed up and I was in this little room and one of the things we always keep the room warm 29 degrees C, which you can people can calculate how warm that is, it's pretty warm.

Speaker 2: 43:47

And I remember I was sitting at the microscope and I was doing the nuclear transfers on the microscope and Gordon was sitting behind me and we had a TV monitor so he could see what I was seeing on the microscope. And he was asking me all these questions about what would it take to do this with horses and and I spent the whole time. We probably those sessions would go for about four or five hours and I spent that whole time essentially trying to talk him out of this because of the problems. I mean there's a whole. You know we have to have access to large numbers of oocytes, that's the donor recipient, that's the egg, okay, and horses, that's really very difficult to get that. And you know we nobody knew how to culture them, nobody knew how to activate or what it took to activate a horse. I mean, when I say activate, in normal reproduction the sperm comes in contact with the egg and then it's fertilized. That egg has been kind of in suspended animation, developed me, developed mentally, and it's just holding, waiting to be activated and that sperm, through the process of fertilization, activates it and then it starts going through the cell cycle and grows, multiplies, divides and the embryo starts growing. Well, you know, there's a kind of chemical process that goes on and it can vary a little bit, although it's fairly well conserved across species. But nobody really knew any of that and it's certainly so. Basically no one knew anything that that nobody knew how to mature eggs in vitro, nobody knew how to culture.

Speaker 2: 45:41

The state of the art for horses was almost ground zero at that point. So I kept telling him, you know, trying to talk him out, and this was 1999, okay is when this conversation had, or, excuse me, 1998. Well, he was persistent and I said he convinced me and I said okay, we'll come up, we'll bring our equipment. We picked up, we took, moved our microscope, we moved the little mechanical arms that allow us to do the microsurgery on the eggs, and we drove all of that up to Moscow, idaho, and we did, I think, one session in 1998, then we did it again and again. The reproduction time period it's horses are seasonally anesterous, so the breeding season essentially is generally from April till August. And so we moved the equipment up in April and we'd leave it up there and then we'd spend a week every month, april, may, june, july and August and then we'd come. You know, we'd put it on hold because the horses go anesterous, and then we'd start it back up again, driving from.

Speaker 2: 47:07

Logan to Moscow Moscow, yeah. And so I knew, and I took a couple of students and a technician and a postdoc with me and, of course, gordon had recruited Dirk Vander Waal from the person that had the expertise and assisted reproduction for horses, so he knew how to ultrasound, he could aspirate eggs directly from the horses follicle, and then he was the one that led the transfers. He and Gordon did the transfers into the recipient animals. And the piece of the story that I should probably tell you is that there was a gentleman who funded this project. His name was Don Jaclyn, now Don. If anybody's heard of Jaclyn Seed, you know Don Jaclyn was the founder and owner of Jaclyn Seed and so he'd provided the funding to do this project. And Don, his hobby was racing mules. Well, back then I had never heard of mule racing. I mean, I was very familiar. You know California, guy Bay, meadows and several other horse tracks. I was pretty familiar with horse racing but not mule racing.

Speaker 1: 48:33

Sounds like an Idaho thing. It's a. It's a bit.

Speaker 2: 48:35

It's a different beast but it's actually quite fun to watch.

Speaker 2: 48:40

So, anyway, don owned racing mules and he wanted to actually have the mule be the first equine species that was cloned, rather than the horse, and so we used the cell line from a champion mule, and so that was the cell line we used. Then we then we used horse oocytes that were aspirated from donor mares and we would clone those and work through the night, clone those. We held them in culture for, I can't remember, I think it was about 10 or 12 hours, and then we immediately transferred those surgically to the overdux of these recipient mares. Well, we went through.

Speaker 1: 49:35

Yeah, how many times.

Speaker 2: 49:36

Okay. So we went through that April, through August in 1999. 2000. 2001. And virtually we would get nothing we had. I can't even remember it's been so long ago whether we may have gotten the hint of some pregnancies, but nothing that we ever saw a heartbeat, and you know that's like with ultrasound, that's like between 25 and 29 days of gestation. So it's really really early when it's still a. What we were it was not really. It's starting to attach, okay.

Speaker 2: 50:22

So I was pretty frustrating, after all that time and a huge amount of work, to consider that we had not had a viable pregnancy after all that time and energy and effort. And so I was kind of you know we had, I kind of was having a heart to heart with Gordon and and saying, you know, I don't know how much, how many more, how much more time you want to devote to this is, and I basically said, is there anything that haven't told me? Because Gordon was going down another pathway. You know, cancer's really quite rare, and particularly prostate cancer is almost unheard of in in stallions, and so he was trying to investigate why, what was unique about stallions, that that was different than than men, and he happened to tell me that. You know I found a really interesting thing in these studies on my cancer studies. Intracellular calcium levels in the in horse systems are extremely different than other species. Really high levels of intracellular calcium. Okay and you're like well.

Speaker 1: 51:49

I'm like ding ding ding. Why couldn't you?

Speaker 2: 51:52

have told me this earlier, three years ago. Yeah, the part of the story. The next what was it? Paul Harvey? The rest of the story the rest of the story is that calcium. Going back to that process of activation of the egg, guess what the key component is that activates the egg? It's intracellular calcium and it spikes inside the egg. And so I said, okay, well, have you looked at follicular fluid? Yes, yes, is it elevated? Yeah, like 30 fold higher.

Speaker 1: 52:29

That's not a simple.

Speaker 2: 52:30

I said look at it over ductal fluid. Yeah, it's about 40. Okay, all right. So I made arrangements. So that was the end of the season in 2001. I made arrangements that fall to get horse suicides and one of the areas of research that my lab had been known for internationally was we did because of all the cloning and because of how important that activation phenomena is to successful cloning and it can impact subsequent development. I had done a lot of research on what was involved in activating catalytic sites. So we'd characterized it, we'd looked at multiple calcium interest of the calcium receptors, we had defined receptors. We define what they responded to, how the calcium transients occurred, and it was very distinct.

Speaker 1: 53:34

So you already had a frame.

Speaker 2: 53:36

I had all of that research done in cattle. So I got these equine oocytes and we looked at the treatment that we had been using to activate these cloned embryos horse embryos or mule embryos rather and I looked at what the interest of the calcium looked like when we did that. Well, nothing Flatline, no interest cellular calcium. So I got the idea to let's increase the concentration of calcium that we keep the egg in, so the medium that was holding the egg Okay.

Speaker 1: 54:22

Is this for your 10 or 12 hours?

Speaker 2: 54:25

No, this is well yes for that. But for right after you'd actually put the nucleus into the enucleated egg, you expose them, the eggs, to the clone, the zygote, clone, zygote, to the specific treatment that is supposed to take and stimulate intrasced cellular calcium spike inside the egg. Well, when we did that, what we'd been treating these eggs, we saw nothing. So I elevated I think it was 10 fold, increasing the calcium that we held the eggs in. We ran the same protocol and, lo and behold, we saw a diagnostic spike of intrascellular calcium in these horse oocytes or horse eggs. And that was the eureka moment.

Speaker 1: 55:21

I don't know how you didn't run out of the building.

Speaker 2: 55:23

Well, I did, and I was like screaming and thinking and I got on the phone immediately and called Gordon.

Speaker 2: 55:29

I said I think I figured this out. We have figured out, I know why we're having a problem. So the very first run which I think for some reason we did it in no, it was April, I can't remember was April or May, anyway, I think it may have been May the first session we did our first transfers and we went home and 25 days later I got a call from Gordon. He said guess what? We've got a pregnancy with a heartbeat.

Speaker 1: 56:07

Oh my gosh.

Speaker 2: 56:08

I said you're kidding.

Speaker 1: 56:09

We're sitting on eggshells for that month.

Speaker 2: 56:11

And so then we went back up in June. We did another session. 25 days later I got another call from Gordon. He said we've got another one with a heartbeat, went and did another session in July. Lo and behold, 25 days later had another heartbeat.

Speaker 2: 56:28

Well, the other thing that's interesting about the story is quite often one of the things that's characteristic with somatic cell, nuclear transfer or clone pregnancies is you'll lose them. In cattle, you know, 45 days, you'll lose them. 90 days you'll lose them. You'll even lose some after 120 days of pregnancy or almost halfway through the pregnancy. So, lo and behold, they kept sitting on eggshells thinking, okay, when are we gonna start losing them? Every month they held, they held. You know, the one from May held, the one from June held, the one from July held. Yeah, 2002 is when we had these pregnancies established, so 11 months. So then, yeah, and it actually and again I may have the months off, but I know that for a fact when they were born, the first was Idaho Gem. He was born in May of 2003. 2003, we had a Utah pioneer that was born in June and then Idaho Star that was born in July of 03.

Speaker 2: 57:43

We did a science article and we announced it, I think on, and had press from everywhere that showed up Moscow, a little old Moscow, idaho, to film the first equine fold from somatic cell nuclear transfer. There was this Idaho Gem. They took film, we interviewed by the BBC, I mean everybody. It was the biggest thing that you can even imagine. And again then we had all three of these. They had no, we didn't need to induce them which again is fairly unique. They were three spectacularly healthy, strong foals that were all born and again for a first. It's almost unheard of to have three Go to term, go to term right and then be fine and be fine. And we were the first in the world to report that. It put Utah State University on the map internationally in that research field. And we've really stayed that way. We've really stayed that way ever since.

Speaker 1: 58:56

And we talked about a true Eureka moment. I mean and I don't think I want to emphasize for everyone who's listening it is the cloning of the mule and the success of having an embryo was enormous. But when he says it's unheard of to have it go to term the first time and then to do that three times, yeah, three out of the three and then have three healthy foals, that's the chances of that were astronomical, exactly. You can't, that would never happen.

Speaker 2: 59:31

Exactly. I mean I think if you look at swine sheep, goats, cattle, you know it's never been that successful right out of the gate, particularly with a species where you don't know many of the biologically important parameters, that would make it successful so yeah, it was a lot of work.

Speaker 2: 1:00:00

It was extremely rewarding, it was very exciting, and it'll be something I'll be able to tell my grandkids of. What it feels like to, at one moment in time, be the only person in the world that understands why something hasn't been working and what the solution is. That's the true Eureka, true Eureka moment.

Speaker 1: 1:00:27

Yeah, that's absolutely just fascinating and experience that only one person can have.

Speaker 2: 1:00:34

Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1: 1:00:35

But the key to that and that's what I hope people get from this interview is perseverance.

Speaker 2: 1:00:43

Exactly. And really just sticking it out, and a lot of you know it wasn't just me. There were a lot of people that dedicated a lot of time, a lot of energy, a lot of contributions to making that happen. And I think when you mix perseverance, hard work and maybe a little bit of luck or insight, you know there's almost nothing you can't solve.

Speaker 1: 1:01:17

Well, you know, I applaud you for that, because it seems like every person that I talk to that's really I don't know how to say it done things they wanted to do from start to end successfully. It's almost always that formula. It's that formula of I'm gonna be here, I'm gonna show up, I'm gonna get a little bit lucky, but really I'm gonna keep coming back to it. And I would say another part of good science is, even if it turns out to be a total flop, you don't let it be a flop until it's a total flop and you've explored all those avenues, then you leave it.

Speaker 2: 1:01:57

Yeah, well, and again.

Speaker 2: 1:01:58

I've told graduate students before that have been disappointed because they view their results as negative or you know it didn't work out. I always tell them that you know what oftentimes the failures are more important, or the negative results are almost more important to publish and to let people know about, because that'll save other people from going down that same path and it'll be able to inform people on things that it's always new knowledge and all data is important to get out in the community so everybody understands something a lot more clearly.

Speaker 1: 1:02:49

Yep well. So I know time is short and I just wanted to. I wanna wrap up with two quick questions. First one is right now, and this is Ethan Doctrine. I believe that a lot of people, that most everyone, has really one thing that they're working on at a time. You know one thing, that at night they're thinking about that thing. For you, right now, what's your thing? You know what's driving you, or what's the thing that you're worried about or thinking about or excited about. What's the thing?

Speaker 2: 1:03:32

Yeah, I think I guess on the worry side, I guess I worry that, through some of the things that have happened in the last two, three years, that there's a lack of trust in science and fact-based research and that, to me, is very concerning because we've made enormous breakthroughs and impacts as a society based on trusting, honest research and data and, as a society, if we move away from using that information to help inform us about decisions moving forward, then I think it's almost like somebody in the wilderness without a map.

Speaker 1: 1:04:48

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:04:50

And we'll have lots of. We'll go down a lot of wrong paths. We'll go down a lot of paths that won't be fruitful and create new opportunities. So I hope that we don't get stuck in a place where we stop trusting research. And I mean, I think one of the things that we should expect when we send our children off to go to college is we should expect that they learn how to, how to evaluate things and how to look at things objectively, and how to take in different pieces of information, be able to analyze them and then make a decision. And so I hope that as a society, we continue to do that and we look for good sources of real information and real data, and we still use that as a valuable tool to help us make good decisions.

Speaker 1: 1:06:12

I think that's great advice. There's a lot of quick decisions made.

Speaker 2: 1:06:17

Yeah, if you want to, and I guess on the other side of the coin, if you want to. What are some of the things I'm most excited?

Speaker 2: 1:06:25

about we live in just a spectacular time. I mean, I've been on this earth for several years and I've never been so excited about the opportunities that are in front of us. I mean, think about it. I mean, in my area, research, we can now sequence almost anything we want to know. The sequence of, and having the sequence of, genes or proteins opens unbelievable doors of opportunity for being out what it's almost inconceivable of the things that we can accomplish in the short amount of time as compared to ten, five, twenty years ago. And so I see, and in the amount of information that people have access to, I think it just is an exciting time to be alive and to be able to see how quickly things are progressing and the positive impact some of those things can have on people's lives.

Speaker 1: 1:07:36

It's exciting to be alive and to see so my very last question, and you know it's a simple and it's a complex question Are you happy?

Speaker 2: 1:07:48

I'm happy right now.

Speaker 2: 1:07:51

Yeah, very happy. You know I've got a lot of things to be grateful for. I mean we live in a great community. I think we live in a state that makes great decisions. The quality of life I mean I, because of my extension job, I have the fortune to be able to. I mean I've been in every county in the state of Utah. I've traveled in every county and truly there's not a place in the state that isn't a wonderful place to live. I think we have more opportunities today than we've ever had, regardless of where you live. Yeah, I've got a great family. I've got, you know, a wife that's been by my side for many, many years, through good times, difficult times. You know I've got five kids and they've got great spouses, 15 grandkids. Life's great. You know. It's not to say I mean you know you always have the disappointments, you always have the challenges, you always. But you also have to look at those, as those challenges are also simultaneously opportunities, right? I?

Speaker 2: 1:09:33

mean they may not look like an opportunity at the time because they're a challenge. But you know, I mentioned I'm a, I'm an old athlete and I and because of my experiences there, you never get stronger, you never get in a better place without having to do some work, without having to experience some pain, having to hurt a little bit, have to hurt a little bit before you can, you can get stronger. And so I see you know lots of opportunities. Yeah, I'm super happy. Well, that's good. I mean I, I work with great people. Yeah, I mean I work for a great association institution and I'm not sure what more I could ask for.

Speaker 1: 1:10:26

I mean the, the insights that you've shared with everyone, the life that you've lived. I always, at the end of this, I encourage the folks that I interview and I want to keep doing this is to to share that. To summarize that, one of the most valuable things I ever had or I found through my family, was my grandma. She made it to 107 and died this year. One of the best things that we have is her journals. She got a daily journal.

Speaker 1: 1:10:53

So folks like you that that that a lot of us, you know, aspire to, to persevere and become like, share that. I mean that those are the kind of things that help, that helped me want to pursue science, seeing people make breakthroughs, seeing people in the ag industry. Sometimes we think you know we're, we're cow guys and you know that's, that's what it is. Well, that's not what it is. There's more you can do and you're you're a living example of that. And anyway, thank you for coming, thank you for sharing all that. I know you know your time is valuable. You have to travel everywhere, but I think this will be a wonderful thing for people to listen to.

Speaker 2: 1:11:37

So thanks, ethan here. Thank you appreciate the opportunity. Thanks.