Teófilo Herrera Suárez
| Teófilo Herrera Suárez | |
|---|---|
| Born |
February 24, 1924 Mexico City, Mexico |
| Residence | Mexico |
| Nationality | Mexican |
| Fields | Mycology |
| Institutions | Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico |
| Alma mater | Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico |
| Doctoral advisor | Manuel Ruíz-Oronoz |
| Known for | contributions to the Mexican mycoflora |
| Notable awards | see honors section |
Teófilo Herrera Suárez (born 24 February 1924) is a Mexican mycologist known for his contributions to the Mexican mycological flora and an Emeritus Professor at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) where he worked for over 50 years.
Herrera is originally from Mexico City. In 1940 he enrolled in the UNAM National High School. In 1942 he decided to study Biology instead of Medicine thanks to the positive influence of his teacher Francisco Villagran. He began as an undergraduate student in the Faculty of Sciences at UNAM and got his degree in 1945. Later on, he moved to the USA to pursue a Master’s degree in Microbiology and Biochemistry of Fermentation, which he obtained in 1953 from the University of Wisconsin in Madison. He expanded his knowledge getting a second bachelor’s degree in 1954, this time in Chemical Biology and Parasitology at the School of Biological Sciences from the National Polytechnic Institute (IPN). Further on, he began his Doctorate’s degree at UNAM; he focused his research in “gasteroid fungi” and got his degree with honors in 1964 with his thesis: “Gasteromycetes of the Valley of Mexico”,.
He began his teaching career in 1946, right after getting his bachelor’s degree, as a lab assistant at the UNAM National High School. Further, he taught in different public and private schools, diverse courses such as Biology, Anthropology and Zootechny. He started as an instructor in 1952 in the Faculty of Sciences teaching for undergraduate students at UNAM, where he eventually taught for over 50 years lectures in Botany, Microbiology, Mycology, and History of Science,.
He started as an assistant researcher for Manuel Ruíz Oronoz, his mentor, in 1945. Ruíz Oronoz’s research was focused on studying fermenting microorganisms from “pulque”. Throughout his scientific career, Herrera has remained interested in fermenting microorganisms behind traditional Mexican alcoholic beverages. Herrera participated in the isolation and identification of pulque fungi, commonly called “pulqueros”, such as: Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Pichia membranaefaciens, Candida boidini, C. incospicua, and numerous species of the genera Kloeckera, Rhodotorula and Torulopsis. In 2003 he published a book entitled: “Más allá del pulque y el tepache” (“Beyond pulque and tepache”), in which he writes about these two beverages as well as other traditional Mexican alcoholic beverages such as “pozol”, “tesgüino” and “colonche”. In this book, as well as in the rest of his research, he always provides information of the social impact and history behind it.
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