Dr Shu Hashimoto obtained his PhD in Reproductive Physiology at Kyoto University in 2001. He started his research career in 1989 by production of transgenic mice, rat, rabbits and cattle. He also developed assisted reproduction technology in cattle (superovulation, transvaginal oocyte retrieval, in-vitro maturation, IVF, intracytoplasmic sperm injection, embryo culture and vitrification) at Snow Brand Milk Products. He moved to IVF Namba Clinic in 2004 and started to work on human assisted reproduction. Currently, he is the research director of IVF Namba Clinic. He was recently secretary-general of the Japan Society of Fertilization and Implantation. He received the Japanese Society of Animal Reproduction innovative technology award in 2008 and the Japanese Society of Mammalian Ova Research outstanding presentation award in 2009.