The Full Professor of the School of Sciences of the University of Navarra, Luis Herrera, has been named favorite son of the Canary Island of La Gomera. The biologist, who received the recognition in a ceremony convened by the president of the Cabildo of La Gomera, was very grateful to the public institution offering his partnership "for any activity they can do in relation to proposals for the conservation of our natural heritage". He also thanked for the support of his family and the different institutions in which he took the first steps of his professional career, such as the high school Cabrera Pinto, the University of La Laguna, the association of Friends of the University of Navarra or the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, among others.

A prolific gomero

Luis Herrera (San Sebastian de La Gomera, 1949) is graduate in Biological Sciences from the University of La Laguna and PhD from the University of Navarra. He was Associate Professor of Biology at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, extended programs of study at the Zoologische Staatssammlung München as scholarship recipient of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and as Visiting Scholar at the University of Munich and the University of Bonn.

Professor of Zoology at the University of Navarra since 1978, he combined his work professor with environmental advisory tasks as a member of the committee Navarro de Medio Ambiente of the Government of Navarra (1990-1996). In 1987 he described an innovative system of numerical nomenclature for the file of species in the Zoology Museum of the University of Navarra.

In 1990 the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation awarded him the award Humboldt in Limnology for his research applied to knowledge of an aquatic ecosystem and he has recently received the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany recently imposed at the German Embassy in Spain. Luis Herrera retired at the beginning of the 2014-2015 academic year but continues his research work as Professor Emeritus at the University of Navarra.