Hiroshi Ohrui was born in 1942. He received his B.S. (1965) and Ph.D. degrees (1971) from The University of Tokyo under the direction of Professor Masanao Matsui. He joined RIKEN in 1966 as a researcher. In 1981, he moved to Tohoku University as Associate Professor in the Department of Food Chemistry, Faculty of Agriculture. In 1977, he was promoted to Full Professor, Graduate School of Life Science. In 2006, he moved to Yokohama University of Pharmacy as Professor. He worked for Dr. J. J. Fox at Sloan Kettering Institute for Cancer Research (1972-1973) as a Research Associate, and for Dr. J. G. Moffatt at Syntex Research (1973-1974) as a postdoctoral fellow. He worked for The Technical University of Darmstadt as an invited professor by DAAD (1990). He has received several awards including The Agricultural Society of Japan Award for Young Scientists (1974), Inoue Prize for Science (2001), Japan Prize of Agricultural Sciences (2004), The Japan Society for Analytical Chemistry Award (2004), and The Japan Academy Prize (2010).

His research interests cover organic synthesis, chemical biology, and chiral discrimination.