She received her B.A. from Reed College and her Ph.D. from Stony Brook University. She completed her post-doctoral training at Harvard University and Columbia University before joining the faculty at University of Washington in 2002. Dr. Ingalls specializes in using organic molecules as a window into the metabolic capabilities of marine microbes. She recently established the Microbial Metabolomics Research Center, a mass spectrometry facility focused on the study of environmentally significant microbes.