My first steps
I was born in the boreal summer of 1979 in San Sebastián (Basque Country, Spain). So, I can said I was born in the seventhies, the decade of my favourite music and social movements, but unfourtunately a bit late to enjoy much more old rock bands, not too late to enjoy the life style. I spent my first four years in one of the most beautiful cities (to me), but luckless again, my parents, including me, moved to Salamanca one week before my fifht birthday. There, they acquired a book shop and I passed almost all my childhood between mountains of books. This was both good and bad. Good, because I can read all the books for free with no need to pay or go to the libray, and bad, because I had to treat the book carefully (to sell it after), and still today I am of this kind of people that cannot write in or wide open a book.
Universitary studies
Because my adolescence was not very interesting (excepting that I passed all the summer holidays in my parents' small villages in direct contact with all the faces of the nature) and this is not a complete biography, I will pass to my universitary studies. I will be brief this time: I studied biology in the University of Salamanca from 1997 to 2002.
Doctoral years
After finishing biology studies, I started a doctoral degree in 2002, also in the University of Salamanca. The project of my doctoral thesis was a contribution to the study of aphyllophoroid and gasteroid fungi from the Biosphere Reserve of Las Batuecas-Sierra de Francia, South Salamanca province (in the middle of the Iberian Peninsula). My supervisor was not a specialist on taxonomy of fungi, so I did all my best (honestly very little) and in those all four doctoral years, I did between very little and nothing (this is not totaly true, my supervisor was a good specialist in palinology and I took advantage to learn many things in this field). In my very first doctoral years, I had not the most relevant bibliography on aphyllophoroid and gasteroid fungi, excepting the second volume of the Breitenbach & Kränzlin's swiss mycoflora and a few reprints. It was a critical period because I was very limited concerning the mycological studies and I was persuaded almost every day to change my thesis subject. In fact, in this period I was able to distinguish only the commonest polipore species but still having doubts to name a specimen of Trametes versicolor (I have to admite that still today I hesitate with the most common or cosmopolitan species from different parts of the world, but I am not the only one!). It was in my fourth and last year of predoctoral grant when I reach (and allowed to do) a research stay out of Salamanca (according to the rules of the Spanish predoctoral grants, at least in those years, you cannot to visit other institutes or universities until the last year, or the last two years, but one of them without any funding). I contacted Annarosa Bernicchia asking for the possibility of spend a three-month period in the University of Bologna.
Bolognese sauce
I arrived to Bologna (Italy) in the spring of 2006. I had my backpack full of unnamed specimens of polipores and corticioids. Annarosa welcome myself to stay in her lab for three months (the maximum allowed by the predoctoral grant). She teached to me to differentiate the main genera of polipores and corticioid fungi and I provided myself with a large amount of bibliography. I had the opportunity to check the large collection of the HUBO herbarium, with very interesting specimens, above all from the Mediterranean area. This was the begining of a profitable collaboration (and a friendship that I have no space and time to explain, my patient reader). Annarosa also pushed me to visit Leif Ryvarden and his huge herbarium. I wanted, however, to go back to Salamanca to collect that autumn and winter, though I wrote to Leif asking for the possibility of a short stay in the next spring. Leif's response was, as always, afirmative.
Scandinavian days
I arrived to Oslo (Norway) in the spring of 2007, only two months before the expiration date of my predoctoral grant. I planned to stay one month in Oslo, visiting the Leif's herbarium and one additional month in Göteborg, checking the specimens of the GB herbarium, under the supervision of Nils Hallenberg, that also answered me in a very positive way. In Oslo I checked a large quantity of specimens and I continued to increasing my bibliography, with the kindness of Leif who provide me with all the books I needed. In Göteborg, I enjoyed many hours in front of the microscopy checking exclusively corticioids this time. I shared many of this hours with Mathias Andreasen, an eager young student. My predoctoral research stays were exclusively focused in classical taxonomy (this done with a microscopy, old books, and dusty envelopes containing fungi), and my immersion in modern taxonomy was scarce. I disturbed only one day the talented, and sweet singer, Elisabet Sjökvist observing how she extracted DNA from pure cultures, but nothing more. It was a pleasure to meet Nils Hallenberg, Karl-Henrik and Ellen Larsson in Sweden, unfortunately I never met Kurt Hjortstam.
Thesis defence
I defended my thesis the first of july of 2008, one year after my predoctoral grant expired (it is usual in Spain not to complete the thesis within the grant period, this is the true, and it is also common that many students never finish their thesis despite having been receiving public funding for four years, this is also true). Some people usually say there is a before and after this important day. I did not noticed any change (excepting that this was my last official day in the University of Salamanca as researcher), but that day was very special because I met Esperanza Beltrán-Tejera, Isabel Salcedo, Gabriel Moreno, and Nils Hallenberg. They were my thesis jury, together with Enrique Rico, professor of botany from the University of Salamanca. It was exciting to meet Nils again, a year after my stay in Göteborg, this time with his wife Laia. We were traveling and enjoying the summer days in Salamanca and in my parents' village.
An atypical and late Erasmus
After my PhD, and with no obligations to the University as researcher, I returned to Italy for an Erasmus (an interchange European program between universities) year in environmental studies, a second Msc degree I started during my predoctoral period. The Italian choice was not accidental and this time I lived in the city of Trento, in the middle of the Italian Alps. It was no accidental because, apart from the beauty of this area, I thought I might have a chance to visit part of the Bresadola's herbarium in Trento and I would not be far from Bologna, being able to continue my collaboration with Annarosa Bernicchia. I visited the Bresadola's herbarium as soon I could contact with the director of Trento Natural Museum. I was between the boxes and specimens of one of the most important Italian mycologist just for few minutes and this was the first and last visit, because unfortunately these few minutes were surrounded by a not specially kind atmosphere of disinterested cooperation. Contrary, Annarosa provides me all the facilities to study a large quantity of HUBO specimens, and in the spring of 2009 we started to prepare the book on Corticiaceae s.l., later (one year!) published in the Fungi Europaei series.
Patagonian winds
During my stay in Trento I reach a postdoctoral grant to continue studies with corticioid fungi in the Argentinean Patagonia under the surpervision of Mario Rajchenberg and Alina Greslebin. It was my first time in South America, as well in the Southern Hemisphere. I arrived to Esquel (Argentina) in the austral summer of 2009. There, I was for more than two lovely years, collecting many interesting and some new undescribed species in the most beautiful places of the Argentinean and Chilean windy Patagonia. There, together with Mario, Alina, and Nils, we described many new species (Aleurodiscus bernicchiae, Aleurodiscus corticola, Aleurodiscus hallenbergii, Aleurodiscus stratosus, Aleurodiscus quilae, Amyloporia nothofaginea, Athelopsis tenuicystidiata, Dendrothele latenavicularis, Gloeocystidiellum rajchenbergii, Hypochnicium patagonicum, Pteridomyces valdivianus, Stereum greslebinii, Subulicystidium curvisporum, and Uncobasidium roseocremeum) and published some beautiful papers. Also, I had the lucky opportunity to met Juliano M. Baltazar and together share some of his first steps in the study of corticioid fungi.
The amazonian bits
During 2012 spring I was invited to examine some specimens from the INPA herbarium in the amazonian city of Manaus. I had very few opportunities to collect by myself (mainly motivated by the Brazilian government bureaucracy) but I was able to report about 35 new records to the Amazon and six new corticioid species (Dendrothele nakasoneae, D. ornata, Gloeodontia halocystidiata, Gloiothele incrustata, G. larssonii, and Peniophora wallacei ).
A Nordic remote, and African outermost remote, experience
Once
back in Spain, I was (and I currently am) collaborating in some
ecological projects with the University of Oslo identifying pieces of
wood (many!) with corticioid fungi, trusted by Jenni Nordén and
Karl-Henrik Larsson. Actually, I am also examining some collections
made by Leif Ryvarden from Africa.
Life in the rural side
While conducting studies on corticioid fungi I have changed my mind a bit starting in 2014 to work on integrational projects for immigrant families in rural areas and environmental education in the countryside with Fundacion Cepaim (www.cepaim.org). At present, I'm also managing the installations of the Center for Biodiversity Conservation in Vilvestre, so you are welcome to visit it (agrodiversidadvilvestre.webs.com).
Back to the University
After some years unlinked to the University of Salamanca I got a position as Associate Professor in the Botany Department. This all combined with a retired peaceful life in the countryside.
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