The fungus strain, originally named HKU32T, was isolated from a toenail clipping of a 68-year-old female patient with onychomycosis at the Queen Mary Hospital in Hong Kong.

The overall morphology of the fungus aligned it with Exophiala, but it had phenotypic characteristics that were not consistent with any other species of that genus.

[1] When grown on Sabouraud dextrose agar culture media, the fungus grows slowly as black, slimy, yeast-like colonies that reach a diameter of 2 mm after 14 days at 25 °C (77 °F).

Then the colony centers develop a velvety texture and become greenish-gray and dome-shaped, while retaining a slimy and yeast-like margin.

After 14 days, the ellipsoidal yeast-like cells are brown when stained with lactophenol cotton blue, and measure 6 by 3.5 μm.