Our Team

Technical director

Luz Cocina Romero

Agricultural Engineer by the Polytechnic University of Valencia (Spain) and former forestry teacher with a fourteen year career in the education sector.

In order to get the necessary training in the truffle sector, she has done internships and research contributions with the main truffle cultivation research centers in Spain. Prior to funding MicoLab, she did several trainings and internships with researchers from the most important Spanish centers that had truffle research departments. These centers include the Agri-Food Technology and Research Centre of the Government of Aragon (CITA), the Mediterranean Center for Environmental Studies (CEAM) and the Forest Science and Technology Centre of Catalonia (CTFC). With those researchers she improved her knowledge on microscopy concepts related to truffle and mycorrhiza identification, quality control of mycorrhizal plants, truffle plant production in nurseries and establishment and management of truffle plantations.

Nowadays, she maintains constant contact and collaborates with researchers, truffle growers and private companies that, combined with her own lab and field work at MicoLab, keep her up-to-date with the advances in plantation management, nursery truffle plant production and mycorrhiza identification.

She also teaches courses on truffle-related topics ranging from microscopy and nursery plant production to management techniques. Some of the educational materials and research papers produced by her can be downloaded in the links section.

Analyst and teaching assistant

Paula Ballester Robles

She has undergraduate studies in Biotechnology and has a Bachelor’s Degree in Early Childhood Education. Thus, she has knowledge and previous experience in the field of microscopy and in the handling of laboratory instruments as well as a base and extensive practice in communication and trainings.

She is responsible for handling and preparing the plants for analysis. She does this with care, precision and attention to detail. As a result, she is very proud of the work she does.

She is also in charge of making the control images of mycorrhizal characters for the nursery mycorrhiza samples, as part of the verification process of the species present. That way the client also has an image folder with the identification work carried out.

Administration and process control

Cristina Rubio Giner

Cristina has studies in Accounting and Business Administration. In her professional life she has worked in the health and construction sectors. She has extensive experience in economic management and work organization in small and medium-sized companies. Her ability to manage and organize the different workspaces of the company is unmatched.

At MicoLab, in addition to her administrative and commercial support duties, she is in charge of optimizing processes and organizing spaces to make work protocols fluid and improve efficiency in laboratory analyses.