Hilisa B. Esteban,PhD

Lead Mycologist / Quality Assurance Manager

Hilisa B. Esteban, PhD Lead Mycologist / Quality Assurance Manager Hilisa Esteban is responsible for defining and implementing the management system and quality assurance program that meets the requirements of Standard ISO / IEC 17025. She joined Aerobiology over eight years ago after working for four years at another national analytical laboratory as a Microbiology Laboratory Manager. She had served on the Review Committee of the Standard Methods for the Examination of Water and Wastewater, Microbiology Section. Before entering the environmental microbiology and microbial indoor air quality industry, Hilisa worked for American Cyanamid / BASF in Princeton as a Project Leader for the Mycology Laboratory which handled the company’s mycological needs in support of fungicide discovery and product development. For a time period, she had served on the Sustaining Membership Committee of the Mycological Society of America and the Standardization of Common Names Committee of the American Phytopathological Society. She graduated from the University of Florida with a Ph.D. in Plant Pathology and Mycology, where her USDA AID – supported research focused on mycorrhizal fungi. As a graduate assistant, she provided statewide mycological support through the Florida Cooperative Extension Service and worked at the University of Florida Mycological Herbarium. She has a B.S. in Agriculture, major in Soil Chemistry and an M.S. in Forestry, major in Tree Physiology. Her postdoctoral research at the USDA-ARS in Maryland was on the taxonomy and nomenclature of plant pathogenic fungi. She continued building the World Fungi Database used by USDA-APHIS for plant risk assessments, for which she was awarded a Certificate of Appreciation. She co-authored with USDA mycologists a book “Fungi on Rhododendron, A World Reference”.