Born in Tokyo in 1968, HOSHIDE Akihiko joined NASDA (currently JAXA) in 1992 and was selected as a Japanese astronaut candidate to board the International Space Station (ISS) in 1999. He became a certified astronaut in 2001. In June 2008, he traveled to the ISS aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery, where, among other operations, he participated in work to attach Kibo’s internal experiment room to the ISS. In July 2012, he traveled again to the ISS aboard the Soyuz spacecraft, deploying small satellites and performing three Extravehicular Activities over the course of roughly four months in space. In 2021, he launched on the Crew-2 Crew Dragon spacecraft and stayed on the ISS as an Expedition 65/66 crew member, logging 198 days, 9 hours and 57 minutes in space. He served as the ISS commander for five months, performed various science experiments, maintenance tasks, and Extravehicular Activity (EVA) on the ISS, including the Japanese Experiment Module “Kibo”. His total EVA time is 28 hours and 17 minutes.