Lydia Paradiso and Fabio Andrés Ávila Castillo

Lydia Paradiso is currently a doctoral student in a joint program between the CUNY Graduate Center and the New York Botanical Garden, where she studies conifer systematics and the spontaneous flora of New York City. She previously received a MSc in Plant Biodiversity from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh. Lydia has taught at Lehman College and for NYBG's School of Professional Horticulture, and was project comanager of the NYC EcoFlora project, NYBG's community science program. She is also the current president of the Torrey Botanical Society, the oldest botanical society in the Americas.

Fabio Andrés Ávila Castillo (Andrés)

is a Colombian forest engineer and second-year PhD student in the Biology–Plant Sciences program at CUNY. His research interests are in systematics and biogeography of neotropical vascular plants, especially in the northern South American Compositae (daisy family), and Proteales (Sabiaceae and Proteaceae [macadamia nut family]). He has worked in several botanic gardens: Bogotá, Cartagena, Medellín (Colombia), and Kew (UK), in conservation, living collections, editorial work, and taxonomy.