CORE TEAM
Philip Ross
Founder and Principal
Philip Ross is an artist and the co-founder of MycoWorks, following a path at the intersection of art, design and biotechnology for over three decades. Phil began cultivating mycelium as a material for art and design in the 1990s, inspired by the beauty and life cycles of mushrooms. A skilled chef and naturalist, his field work in mycology began in the woods of upstate New York, where he first learned to forage for wild mushrooms. His subsequent work as a hospice caregiver in San Francisco introduced him to the immune-supporting benefits of reishi mushrooms, which he began growing for medicinal use. He discovered a rich diversity in form, texture and color—expressions of reishi’s dynamic response to the everyday forces of light, air, gravity and temperature. Phil soon began working with reishi as a material for creating sculptures, bringing culinary precision and a naturalist’s keen eye to perfect his “biotechniques” for growing living works of art.
Philip pioneered materials research which launched the field of mycotecture, a term he coined in 2008 to describe the art of designing and building with mycelium. His mycelium artworks and installations have been exhibited internationally at MoMA, Kunsthalle Düsseldorf and The Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art, and his patents and publications are foundational to the field of mycelium material science. When worldwide interest in Phil’s material inventions brought opportunities to partner with brands seeking innovative, sustainable materials, Phil invited his long-time artistic collaborator, Sophia Wang, to start a company.
Courtney Fink
Co-Founder;
Director of Artist Programs and Deputy Director
Courtney Fink works in the expanded field of nonprofit leadership as a steadfast champion of visual artists and the organizations that center and support them. Her mission is to advance ideas and projects in which artists and experimental platforms are positioned to manifest social change and establish equitable access in the arts.
For 30 years she has worked to draw national attention to and build capacity in the visual arts as exemplified in her role as co-founder and executive director of Common Field (2012-2020) and as executive director of Southern Exposure (2002-2015).
She founded the Alternative Exposure Grant Program in partnership with the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, laying the groundwork for the Foundation’s revered national Regional Re-granting Program, currently active in 35 cities and regions across the US. Fink is also active in the philanthropic sector as a consultant, board member and advisor for numerous renowned awards and programs.
Rachel Linzer
Co-Founder;
Co-Director of Science
Rachel Linzer has been applying biology to understand and protect our environment and contribute to human health for over two decades. Passionate about fungal possibility, she was dedicated to research and development of sustainable mycomaterials as a principal scientist at MycoWorks. Since 2022, she has worked on a new project to accelerate applied mycological innovation through open scientific and cultural resources. Her PhD research focused on introduced tree pathogens in less-managed forest ecosystems. Beyond, her research in industry and academia ranges from cellular agriculture to bacterial pathogenesis and cancer immunotherapeutics.
Rolando Perez
Co-Founder;
Co-Director of Science
Dr. Perez is a bioengineer from Ohlone, Rumsen, Mutsun and Salinan lands in the Salinas Valley of California. For over 13 years he has woven together culture and technology to create solutions, experiences and possibilities to cultivate a better world. He has founded numerous public benefit organizations and his scientific research experience spans synthetic biology, metamaterials and artificial intelligence. He holds a Ph.D. in bioengineering from Stanford University where he founded the synthetic mycology capacities in the Department of Bioengineering, a B.S. in biomolecular engineering from University of California, Santa Cruz where he co-founded the UCSC International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) team, and numerous A.S. degrees from Hartnell Community College. Outside of his work at Stanford, he is an Affiliate Research Scientist at Blue Marble Space Institute for Science at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Ames Research Center (NASA ARC) where he leads engineered living materials and biomining programs.
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Philip RossChair
See above for Phil’s biography.
N. Louise Glass
Secretary
N. Louise Glass, Ph.D., is a professor in the Plant and Microbial Biology Department at the University of California-Berkeley and a senior faculty scientist in the Environmental Genomics and Systems Biology Division at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
Glass has focused on dissecting transcriptional regulatory networks in filamentous fungi associated with nutrient acquisition and plant biomass deconstruction using systems biology approaches. Glass also works on fungal communication that contributes to decisions on cooperation versus competition among fungi, a project that has been instrumental in defining molecular mechanisms of innate immunity in fungi. Glass’ more recent work includes developing high-throughput functional genomics approaches for non-model fungi to investigate plant-microbe-fungal interactions.
Glass received her Ph.D. from the University of California-Davis in plant pathology and performed her post-doctoral work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison on fungal genetics/molecular biology. Glass joined the University of British Columbia Biotechnology Laboratory in 1989 as an assistant and then associate professor. In 1999, Glass moved to the Plant and Microbial Biology Department at UC-Berkeley, where she currently holds a full professorship position.
Glass is an international leader in systems biology approaches to fungal genetics, genomics and applications of fungi to bioenergy, biofuels and the environment. Glass is the UCB Fred E. Dickinson Chair of Wood Science and Technology, a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), a fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology, a fellow of the Mycological Society of America (MSA) and was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2021.
Rosten Woo
Treasurer
Rosten Woo is a designer, writer, and educator living in Los Angeles. He produces civic-scale artworks and works as a collaborator and consultant to a variety of grassroots and nonprofit organizations. His work has been exhibited at the Cooper Hewitt Design Triennial; the Venice Biennale of Architecture; the Netherlands Architecture Institute; the Storefront for Art and Architecture; the Lower East Side Tenement Museum; and various piers, public housing developments, tugboats, shopping malls, and parks in New York and Los Angeles. He is the cofounder and former executive director of the Center for Urban Pedagogy (CUP), a New York-based nonprofit organization dedicated to using art and design to foster civic participation. His book, Street Value, about race and retail urban development, was published by Princeton Architectural Press in 2010. He teaches art and design at the California Institute of the Arts, Pomona College, and ArtCenter College of Design and has lectured internationally.
Advisors
Vera Meyer
Supporter and Advisor
Prof. Vera Meyer runs the Chair of Molecular and Applied Microbiology at Technische Universität Berlin, Germany, since 2011. The focus is on researching and optimising fungal cell factories, with the aim of making more effective use of fungal metabolic potentials for the production of medicines, platform chemicals, enzymes, and biomaterials. Together with her team, she pursues a holistic approach and develops and combines methods from systems biology and synthetic biology to genetically and metabolically engineer fungal cell factories. Her inter- and transdisciplinary research projects combine natural and engineering sciences with art, design, and architecture and create bio-based scenarios for the built environment and beyond. Vera Meyer is also active as a visual artist under the pseudonym V. meer and uses the means of art to make society more aware of the potential of fungi for a sustainable future.