1980 - Australia's first IVF baby born

Photograph courtesy of Monash University Archives. Photography by Richard Crompton. Image number: 350

Professors Alan Trounson and Carl Wood of the Monash Institute of Reproduction and Development (MIRD) achieve Australia's first successful IVF birth. This was the world's 4th IVF baby.

12 out of first 15 IVF babies in the world are Monash babies.

Today: Institute scientists were responsible for the first IVF baby born from frozen human embryos, the first IVF baby born from women without ovaries, development of techniques for sperm microinjection in male factor infertility and the first IVF baby born in Australia.

New techniques and improvements to increase the success rate of in vitro fertilisation, and thus help infertile couples, are constantly being developed at the Institute.