Yoshimasa Kawata was born in 1963 in Fukushima, Japan. He received BE, ME and Ph.D. degrees in the field of Applied Physics from Osaka University in 1987, 1989 and 1992 respectively. His main field of interest is nonlinear optics using photorefractive crystals. Since 1992, he has been an assistant professor for applied physics at Osaka University. In 1995-1996, he was a researcher at AT&T (Lucent Technologies) Bell Laboratories in the United States. In 1997, having returned to Japan, he became an associate professor at Shizuoka University in the field of mechanical engineering, leading to a full professor position eight years later. In 2017, he was awarded the position of Dean of Faculty of Engineering. Currently, he is serving as a Trustee/Executive Director and Vice President of Shizuoka University.