Bridget A. Vincent

I'm from Florida, where the crazy ecology first sparked my interest in biology. In high school, I got a certificate as a veterinary assistant through vocational programs, and through that experience I learned that the research side of veterinary medicine was what really interested me, not clinical practice. During my undergraduate years at UCF in Orlando, I got involved in research pretty early, studying tortoise ecology and pit viper phylogenetics. Through that hands-on work, I realized what research topics truly fascinated me - the evolution side, and understanding how these weird things in nature came to be. I was really interested in octopus research and was looking into labs that studied weird things that octopuses do, which is how I found my current lab at UCSB. I joined thinking my whole dissertation would be on bioluminescence and squids and octopuses, but a few years in, I applied to a field course in Panama for jellyfish research. Once I went, it was just super fun finding jellyfish everywhere and seeing what we could find out from that kind of data. They had an opportunity to come back as an intern and lead your own research project, so I changed half my dissertation to jellyfish in order to explore that more. That Smithsonian internship has been my most notable achievement so far - not necessarily because it's what someone would pick out from a resume, but because it opened so many research doors for me and collaboration doors. Aside from being a scientist, I'm also an artist, and I've been collaborating with Dreams of a Scientist on science communication initiatives. We started highlighting local scientists in their hometowns through note cards at breweries, and we're preparing for the Street Painting Festival in Santa Barbara where we'll do street art about local kelp forests while highlighting local scientists. This work has been teaching me what is possible when you just think about what problems are out there and how you might be able to solve them.