Kate Jaggi, MS ’24 (PWS), stared at her computer screen, unable to fully comprehend the data in front of her. Without a word, she rose, quickly walked over to her undergraduate mentor, Dr. Jeff Maughan, and held out her laptop for him to view. Looking silently over the results, a grin spread across his face. “We didn't know that this chromosome inversion was there,” he informed her, delighted. “You’re sitting on a piece of information that no one else in the world knows.” Jaggi felt an incredible thrill. She had made an unprecedented discovery, a scientist’s dream. The excitement and inspiration of that moment fueled a new love for the scientific process.
“[Research] is what I need to pursue, and my classes are scaffolding for that,” Jaggi says. Initially, she viewed it as an intimidating extracurricular activity that people had to go out of their way to participate in. Finding work that she cared about changed her perspective. Jaggi now sees classes as an avenue for exploring new topics. She notes, “My experience at BYU got infinitely better when I stopped looking at my education as grades and classes that I had to complete, and started looking for opportunities to engage in real-life applications.”
My experience at BYU got infinitely better when I stopped looking at my education as grades and classes that I had to complete, and started looking for opportunities to engage in real-life applications.
Nurturing an Interest in Plant Genetics
When Jaggi began her genetics and genomics undergraduate degree, she thought her education would primarily focus on medicine and human diseases like cystic fibrosis. Taking Maughan’s quantitative genetics class, and later working in his plant genetics lab, opened her eyes to the wide-reaching applications of genetics. Chenopodium, Maughan’s research focus, is the genus under which quinoa falls, which has a promising nutrient profile that could address global food insecurity. Maughan started assigning her independent work, a choice Jaggi attributes to her work ethic and unceasing curiosity. Near the end of her bachelor’s degree, she discovered the chromosome inversion in Chenopodium quinoa. She has since co-authored a forthcoming peer-reviewed journal article sharing their discovery with the world.
“Most scientists will not contribute a single, massively life-changing scientific discovery, like CRISPR, to the world in their career. So that can't be my drive for science, because I'm definitely going to fail if that's my yardstick,” Jaggi reflects. Flipping her attitude on what success looks like spurred Jaggi to rethink what she was pursuing and why. She realized that, “finding new pieces of information nobody else knows and figuring out how the world works feels very creative and new to me.” Building up her community’s scientific knowledge through these bite-sized breakthroughs is where Jaggi sees herself creating a meaningful scientific career.
Jaggi views genetics as an invaluable resource that can be used globally to improve nutrition and decrease inequality.
For instance, Jaggi’s thesis centers on understanding the genomes of wild Chenopodium relatives. Other scientists can use this information to breed desirable traits into domesticated quinoa and improve its nutrition, resilience, and growing success. Based on work like Jaggi’s, plant breeders can select which potential wild candidate species have the most valuable gene traits and use them to systemically improve crops like quinoa. Jaggi views genetics as an invaluable resource that can be used globally to improve nutrition and decrease inequality. She hopes that, in the long run, the process will make quinoa even more accessible and sustainable for the people who need it most.
Emulating Christ's Role As Teacher
Jaggi’s experiences with scientific discovery have strengthened her faith in God and the divine in ways she never thought possible. “Understanding the order and systems of the universe are how I get to know both God and science, because to me, they are inseparable,” she shares. “One of my main methods of feeling close to God and the universe is trying to understand how He works in science and nature around me.” Her three years as a PWS 340 teaching assistant have also helped her picture God’s joy when His children discover Him through science. The process of breaking down complex concepts puts Jaggi in the position to teach others about the universe’s building blocks. “To see somebody else take a lot of material that once felt very indigestible, realize it’s accessible to them, and get excited about it is really incredible to me,” she enthuses.
Sometimes her students go even further than Jaggi expects. She distinctly remembers a stand-out neuroscience student on track for the pre-med program, like she had once been. During their meetings, he peppered her with questions about her journey, and she eagerly shared her love for genetics research and its many applications. Months later, he announced that he had switched majors to pursue genetics, despite family pressure to stay on the pre-med track. “The excitement is contagious,” Jaggi shrugs with a grin. “I guess I like [propelling] people’s lives by getting them into research.”
Looking forward, Jaggi will continue with genetics and genomics research at Duke University this fall.