Margarita Silva-Hutner

Silva-Hutner was born in Rio Piedras, Puerto Rico.[1] She graduated with a B.A. from the University of Puerto Rico in 1936.[1] She then worked at the Columbia University School of Tropical Medicine in San Juan under Arturo L. Carrión for 13 years.[2] Silva-Hunter’s work with Carrión focused on fungal infections, especially chromoblastomycosis.[2]

Silva-Hutner began attending Harvard University on a scholarship in 1950 and joined the Mycology Laboratory at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center later that year.[2] She received her doctorate in 1952.[1]

In 1956, Silva-Hutner became director of the Mycology Laboratory and an assistant professor in the College of Physicians & Surgeons.[1] She was promoted to associate professor in 1963[1] and remained on the faculty at Columbia University for over fifty years.[3] She retired from her position as director in 1981 but continued to teach.[1] Silva-Hutner died in 2002 after a lengthy illness.[1]

Silva-Hutner was a founding member of the Medical Mycological Society of New York.[3] Her research contributed to the development of Nystatin, the first antifungal medicine approved for human use.[3] She served as Chair of the Nomination Committee for the Medical Mycological Society of the Americas at the time of its founding and was active within the organization.[4]

Silva-Hutner’s work on chromoblastomycosis laid the groundwork for further research on this pathogen, which remains among the most difficult fungal infections to manage.[5] She published more than fifty articles on the biology and taxonomy of pathogenic fungi over the course of her career.[2]

In 1986 she was the recipient of the Medical Mycological Society of the America’s Rhonda Benham Award.[6] In 1996, she was given an award for “Excellence in Medical Mycology” at a symposium called “A Diagnostic Medley of Medical Mycology.”[7] Silva-Hutner was also a Fellow and Diplomate of the American Board of Medical Microbiology.[7]