Pioneer award 2026                          Dr Serge Lacaze

Serge Lacaze is Manager of the Biotechnology Department at AURIVA Élevage, the Regional Union of Genetic Improvement and Artificial Insemination Cooperatives in Southwest France. He is an Agricultural Engineer (Zootechnics) from the École Supérieure d’Agriculture de Purpan, Toulouse, France. For more than 40 years, he has been dedicated to the development and application of reproductive biotechnologies and genetic improvement programs in livestock, with a primary focus on dairy and beef cattle breeding.

His professional and scientific activities have concentrated on embryo production and transfer, Ovum Pick-Up and in vitro embryo production (OPU-IVP), embryo biopsy and genotyping, embryo sexing, cryopreservation, and reproductive genomics. A major area of his work has been bovine fertility, particularly the application and comparison of in vivo and in vitro embryo production systems under commercial breeding and genetic selection conditions, as well as the translation of laboratory results to practical field applications.

At AURIVA Élevage, he coordinates reproductive biotechnology strategies across 16 dairy and beef cattle genetic selection programs. He has played a pivotal role in the design and implementation of embryo transfer–based genetic improvement programs in Europe, South America, Asia, and Africa, including large-scale field programs in Brazil, Peru, Chile, Mexico, Vietnam, Cameroon, and Réunion Island.

His work is characterized by extensive international collaborations, numerous scientific publications, and invited lectures. In parallel, he has been strongly involved in the training and supervision of specialists and technicians in embryo transfer and Ovum Pick Up, contributing to methodological standardization, capacity building, and technology transfer in both cooperative and international contexts. He is an active member of the European Society of Embryo Transfer (AETE) and served as a Board Member for 10 years, committed to bridging applied research and field innovation in animal reproduction.

Dr Lacaze will present his talk entitled "Forty years in the field: reproductive biotechnologies shaping genetic progress in cattle."