Juli Simon is a Brazilian Biologist who graduated from the Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC), in Florianópolis, SC, with a Master’s degree in Mycology from the National Institute of Amazon Research (INPA) in Manaus, AM. Since 2012, Juli has been studying, learning, and teaching mycology-related subjects. As mushroom enthusiasts, they are always interested in discussing all kinds of fungi. They are also a music lover, studying and playing the transversal flute and percussion. They believe mushrooms are the key to a better understanding of life and death, interconnectedness, and learning to be in the present by embracing the ephemeral. Think fungi, for love’s sake.

Lilian Fraiji has a master’s degree in Comisariado de Arte from the Universidad Ramon Llull de Barcelona. She is an independent producer and commissioner based in Manaus, Amazonas. She is the co-founder of LABVERDE and has curated several art exhibitions related to the theme of art and ecology in Brazil, the United States, and Europe. She is currently the beneficiary of the Serrapilheira Programme, curator of the Tomorrow is Now online Festival, and collaborates with Sonic Matter: The Witness (Festival in Switzerland) and SIM São Paulo.

A fungal and mycorrhizal ecologist from Punta Arenas, Chile. She is currently an Assistant Professor at the Universidad Católica del Maule in Talca, Chile; Director of Communications at the International Society of Mycorrhiza (IMS), Co-founder and active member of the South American Mycorrhizal Research Network and Associate Scientist at SPUN initiative (Society for the Protection of Underground Networks). (1) Research on fundamental scientific questions about mycorrhizal ecology and applications of mycorrhizal fungi and mycorrhizal symbiosis in restoration ecology and silvicultural/agronomical contexts. (2) Undergrad and grad students’ formation on fungal and mycorrhizal ecology and applications. (3) Scientific outreach focused mainly (not only) on fungal and mycorrhizal science outreach.

Artist and cultural manager. Bachelor of Arts from the Catholic University of Chile. Since 2015 she has been the director of the Alberto Baeriswyl House-Museum in Tierra del Fuego and the head of the CAB’s Art, Science, and Humanities Residency Program. Areas of interest: the transmission of knowledge through experiences. Memory and the permanent exercise of memory. The crosses are between photography, contemporary art, architecture, heritage, and science.

Martina is interested in diverse aspects of the symbiotic interaction between forest trees and fungi, the so-called ectomycorrhizal symbiosis. She studies the neutral and functional diversities of mycorrhizal fungi in forests and their role in forest ecosystems in a changing environment. In particular, the impact of drought and nitrogen deposition on the community structure and function of mycorrhizal fungi is her research focus. She is also interested in how forest fungi adapt to their environment and lifestyle. She mainly uses molecular markers to study the communities and populations of mycorrhizal fungi and both gene expression and enzymatic assays for functional studies.

Benjamin is passionate about evolutionary biology and how organisms interact with their environment. In particular, he has a keen interest in studying the local adaptation of populations in forest and alpine ecosystems. How and why the tree of life maintained complex mating systems is a facet of biology that fascinates him. Using genomic tools and high-resolution environmental descriptors, he dedicates his research activities to improving our understanding of (co-)adaptation processes in plant-fungi symbiotic partners.

Irène Hediger is head of the artists-in-labs program (AIL), Department of Cultural Analysis at the Zurich University of the Arts. She curates and promotes inter- and transdisciplinary exchange and practices at the interface of art, science and technology in the fields of environmental science, astrophysics, biology, neuroscience and medicine. In 2009, she initiated the international artists-in-labs Residency Exchange program. Hediger has curated numerous exhibitions and accompanying programs on contemporary art, science and technology.

Margaux lives and works between Berlin, Germany, and Vevey, Switzerland. She is a cultural producer and curator working at the intersection of art, ecology, and hospitality, prioritizing spaces outside the gallery context. In 2016, she founded Foodculture days, a knowledge-sharing platform around food ecologies and politics. The Swiss-Mexican curator focuses her research on notions of hospitality, conviviality, and access to the arts where food is considered a nutritive, ideological, conceptual, and discursive material, approached through the specificities of artists, researchers, gardeners, historians, and other forms of more-than-human intelligence. Schwab is interested in how art can reconnect us with these territories in a sensible way.