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If you’ve ever wondered what it takes to study the prehistoric giants lurking in Southern swamps, meet Mississippi State doctoral student Taylor Szasz Green, a computational biologist dedicated to decoding genetic secrets.

“Explaining computational biology can be tricky because it’s such a broad field,” said Szasz Green, originally from Ontario, Canada, but transplanted to Myrtle, Mississippi, when she was a toddler. “In simple terms, it uses tools from statistics, math modeling and computer science to answer questions about biological systems. People often expect my work to be evenly split between biology and computation, but 90% of my time is spent staring at a computer. The rest is what I call ‘squishy science,’ or bench work.”

After earning her undergraduate degree in biomedical engineering from MSU, her interest in computational biology began at Washington University School of Medicine, where she worked in a research lab studying genetic mutations affecting children with bacterial infections. It wasn’t until she returned to �㽶ֱ��in 2021 to begin a Ph.D. program in computational biology that she found her true calling—investigating the evolution of genes regulating meiosis, a critical process in sexual reproduction.

“Alligators were a natural fit for me,” Szasz Green said. “They were once on the endangered species list due to habitat destruction and overhunting, but what intrigued me was whether their slow evolutionary rate would impact their ability to recover from low population numbers.”

Szasz Green’s research, which received a 2022 Honorable Mention from the National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowships Program, focuses on the genetic diversity of alligators and whether inbreeding could be a problem as their populations rebound. So far, she has found that despite a large modern-day population, alligators have higher levels of inbreeding compared to their American crocodile cousins.

“Meeting Mississippi alligator hunters and getting on the water with them was incredible,” she said. “It deepened my connection to the alligators and the people who respect them.

“Biology is so much more than just a path to medical school,” Szasz Green added. “ It’s for problem-solvers and creative thinkers. The skills you gain are highly transferable. You can become a patent lawyer, software engineer and so much more.”

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