Search People Result | Academic Influence

Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines

Find famous and important people related to your research. This is an excellent tool for research papers, topic papers, and building a bibliography. Using our influence-based algorithm, our rankings synthesize data from Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef.

Students and researchers now have a fast and reliable way to find influential thinkers from 24 disciplines and 300 sub-disciplines (and growing). If you want to find history’s most influential philsosophers, or the world’s most influential mathematicians currently, now you can.

We also provide custom rankings of people by discipline as well as interviews with influential academics who are currently active.

To use this tool, select the discipline (and optional subdiscipline) relevant to your research, and specify influential academics by history, world, or US. Even results that are counterintuitive are often enlightening (our algorithm always picks up a signal).

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School

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Discipline

Subdiscipline

Ranking

List of the most influential people in Biology,

#5551

Peter Jäger

#44321

Overall Influence

1968 - Present (58 years)

Peter Jäger is a German arachnologist, and current Head of Arachnology at the Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum in Frankfurt, Germany. He has named several spiders after celebrities; in 2008, he named Heteropoda davidbowie after British singer David Bowie, and Heteropoda ninahagen after German singer Nina Hagen. In 2013, he named Ctenus monaghani after actor Dominic Monaghan, to honor his work in the documentary series Wild Things with Dominic Monaghan.

#5552

Bernhard Schink

#105778

Overall Influence

#5553

Michael Schwartz

#105796

Overall Influence

#5554

Anthony William Linnane

#100485

Overall Influence

1930 - 2017 (87 years)

Anthony William Linnane was an Australian professor of biochemistry, known for his work on mitochondria. Career Linnane's work investigated the biogenesis of mitochondria in yeast, the biosynthesis of mitochondrial enzymes, and the selective effects of antibiotics on protein synthesis in the mitochondria and cytoplasm. He is particularly well known for the hypothesis that the accumulation of DNA mutations in mitochondria is a causal process in aging and degenerative disease.

#5555

Bruce W. Hollis

#105806

Overall Influence

#5556

Jerry Silver

#46926

Overall Influence

Jerry Silver is an American neuroscientist and professor in the Department of Neurosciences at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine. He is known for his research using rat models to develop treatments for spinal cord injuries. He became a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2011.

#5557

William Jeffery

#103216

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (73 years)

William R. Jeffery is an American professor of evolutionary developmental biology whose studies focus on the evolution of development, especially blind cavefish and tunicates. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the Linnean Society of London.

#5558

Miriam Phoebe de Vos

#87766

Overall Influence

1912 - 2005 (93 years)

Miriam Phoebe de Vos was a leading South African botanist and academic. She was an expert on bulbous plants, especially Romulea. She also had a special interest in Moraea and Clivia. Career She studied at the University of Stellenbosch and obtained her BSc and MSc . She held a junior lecture position from 1939 at the University of Cape Town. She obtained a DSc in Botany in 1940 from Stellenbosch University with the thesis "A cytological study on South African genera of the Aizoaceae and the Proteacea". In 1941 she joined the Botany Department of the University of Stellenbosch. Cytology, embryology, anatomy and biosystematics were the subjects she lectured in.

#5559

Earl Dorchester Hanson

#78685

Overall Influence

1927 - 1993 (66 years)

Earl Dorchester Hanson was born in Northern India to Methodist Missionaries. He attended an American-run missionary school, Woodstock School, in Mussoorie in the Western Indian Himalayas, along with his siblings. He is the older brother of Edith Hanson and younger brother of Robert M. Hanson. After serving in the United States Marine Corps in World War II, he graduated from Bowdoin College and earned a Ph.D. in biology in 1954 from Indiana University.

#5560

Enrique Chaneton

#27289

Overall Influence

Enrique J. Chaneton was an Argentinian ecologist. He completed his bachelor's degree in 1986. He then studied at the University of Buenos Aires, and completed a master's degree in 1995, working under . He then moved to the University of London, and did a PhD with John Lawton, graduating in 1998. His research was on the structure and dynamics of plant communities in the pampas, or grasslands, of Argentina. Within this system, he studied biological disturbance, and specifically biological invasion. He served as an associate editor of the journal Biological Invasions. According to an obituary, h...

#5561

Salvatore Pizzo

#102284

Overall Influence

Salvatore Vincent Pizzo is an American scientist, currently Distinguished Professor of Pathology at Duke University Medical Center and an Elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

#5562

Mick Crawley

#100116

Overall Influence

1949 - Present (77 years)

Michael John Crawley is a British Emeritus Professor of Plant Ecology at Imperial College London. He is based at Silwood Park campus near Ascot, Berkshire. His research focuses on the relationship between plants and their herbivores, and on the way that alien plants modify plant community dynamics.

#5563

Helen McShane

#47574

Overall Influence

Helen Irene McShane is a British infectious disease physician and a professor of vaccinology, in the Jenner Institute at the University of Oxford, where she has led the tuberculosis vaccine research group since 2001. She is senior research fellow at Harris Manchester College, Oxford.

#5564

Paul Peter Rosen

#105887

Overall Influence

#5565

James Howard Shaw

#105894

Overall Influence

#5566

Denisa D Wagner

#105900

Overall Influence

#5567

Ivan Boszormenyi-Nagy

#6109

Overall Influence

1920 - 2007 (87 years)

Ivan Boszormenyi-Nagy was a Hungarian-American psychiatrist and one of the founders of the field of family therapy. Born Iván Nagy, his family name was changed to Böszörményi-Nagy during his childhood. He emigrated from Hungary to the United States in 1950, and he simplified his name to Ivan Boszormenyi-Nagy at the time of his naturalization as a US citizen.

#5568

Vojo Deretic

#103965

Overall Influence

Vojo Deretic, is distinguished professor and chair of the Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine. Deretic was the founding director of the Autophagy, Inflammation and Metabolism Center of Biomedical Research Excellence. The AIM center promotes autophagy research nationally and internationally.

#5569

Daniel Edward Atkinson

#105915

Overall Influence

#5570

Gregory Mccarthy

#105917

Overall Influence

#5571

Christopher Thiemermann

#105922

Overall Influence

#5572

Keith Vickerman

#91740

Overall Influence

1933 - 2016 (83 years)

Keith Vickerman FRS FRSE FMedSci was a British zoologist born in Huddersfield, Yorkshire. He was Regius Professor of Zoology in the University of Glasgow, 1984–98. He was awarded the Linnean Medal in 1996. A Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, he was one of the organization's founding members.

#5573

Irfan Rahman

#105937

Overall Influence

#5574

John Christopher Lindon

#105946

Overall Influence

#5575

Christopher H. Polman

#105954

Overall Influence

#5576

Gilbert Vassart

#105955

Overall Influence

#5577

Ronald Fayer

#105959

Overall Influence

#5578

A. K. Mukherjee

A. K. Mukherjee

#100360

Overall Influence

1970 - Present (56 years)

Ashis K. Mukherjee is an Indian biochemist specializing in snake venom biochemistry, molecular biology and microbiology. He served as the Head of the Department of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology of Tezpur University during 2008– 2011. Known for his research on snake venom biochemistry, proteomic composition and other proteins related work from microbial and plant background, Mukherjee serves as the head and coordinator of the Nodal Center for Medical Colleges and Biomedical Research Institutes of North East India at Tezpur University. The Department of Biotechnology of the Government of I...

#5579

Henry N Ginsberg

#105981

Overall Influence

#5580

Rong Li

#100759

Overall Influence

1967 - Present (59 years)

Rong Li is the Director of Mechanobiology Institute, a Singapore Research Center of Excellence, at the National University of Singapore. She is a Distinguished Professor at the National University of Singapore's Department of Biological Sciences and Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of Cell Biology and Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and Whiting School of Engineering. She previously served as Director of Center for Cell Dynamics in the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine’s Institute for Basic Biomedical Sciences. She is a leader in understanding cellula...

#5581

Reza Dana

#70642

Overall Influence

Reza Dana is the Claes H. Dohlman Professor of Ophthalmology, senior scientist and W. Clement Stone Clinical Research Scholar at Massachusetts Eye and Ear, Harvard Medical School, and director of the Harvard-Vision Clinical Scientist Development Program.

#5582

Lois K. Miller

#100446

Overall Influence

1945 - 1999 (54 years)

Lois Kathryn Miller was an American geneticist and academic. She was a Distinguished Research Professor of Genetics and Entomology at the University of Georgia. A graduate of Upsala College, she taught at the University of Idaho before moving to Georgia. Miller's research was related to baculoviruses, which infect agricultural pests. She was elected to the National Academy of Sciences and was a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

#5583

Nils Malmer

#101152

Overall Influence

1928 - 2018 (90 years)

Per Nils Johan Alfred Malmer was a Swedish plant ecologist. Malmer graduated and took his PhD in plant ecology at Lund University. He had then already been a research assistant in limnology 1948-1950, teaching assistant in systematic botany and plant ecology 1953-1959 and assistant professor of plant ecology 1959-1963. From 1963-1993, he was professor of plant ecology at Lund University.

#5584

Susan Harrison

#105936

Overall Influence

Susan Patricia Harrison is a professor of ecology at the University of California, Davis who works on the dynamics of natural populations and ecological diversity. She is a fellow of the Ecological Society of America and the California Academy of Sciences. She has previously served as vice president of the American Society of Naturalists. She was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2018.

#5585

Richard J”︁ Traystman

#106031

Overall Influence

#5586

Michele Pagano

#104149

Overall Influence

1961 - Present (65 years)

Michele Pagano is an Italian-American biochemist and cancer biologist best known for his work on cell cycle control and the ubiquitin-proteasome system. He is currently the chairman of the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, and the Ellen and Gerald Ritter Professor of Oncology at the New York University School of Medicine. He is also an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. His laboratory has played a central role in elucidating the role of a family of enzymes, the cullin-RING ubiquitin ligases , in mediating the proteolysis of key cellular regulators. In ...

#5587

Monte Westerfield

#106032

Overall Influence

2000 - Present (26 years)

#5588

Robert Stone Dow

#106045

Overall Influence

#5589

Michael W. Stumvoll

#106047

Overall Influence

#5590

Mary Carrington

#102250

Overall Influence

Mary N. Carrington is an American immunologist researching the role of host genetics in cancer, autoimmunity and infectious disease pathogenesis. She is director of the basic science program at the Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research.

#5591

Marian Packham

#91235

Overall Influence

1927 - 2020 (93 years)

Marian Aitchison Packham was Professor Emerita in biochemistry at University of Toronto. She researched biochemical and physiological activities of blood platelets. Education Packham studied Biochemistry at the University of Toronto, obtaining her BA in 1949 and completing her doctorate in 1954.

#5592

Garth Chapman

#85033

Overall Influence

1917 - 2003 (86 years)

Professor Garth Chapman was an academic and author in the field of zoology. He enjoyed a long career in the University of London, culminating in his Professorship of Zoology at Queen Elizabeth College from 1958 to 1982 specialising in the study of fluids and hydrostatics in animal systems. He died on 1 November 2003 at his home in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk.

#5593

Wim G. J. Hol

#106066

Overall Influence

#5594

Robert P. Perry

#106067

Overall Influence

#5595

Christian F. Beckmann

#106080

Overall Influence

2000 - Present (26 years)

#5596

Motoharu Seiki

#106093

Overall Influence

1949 - Present (77 years)

#5597

Michael Cowley

#32519

Overall Influence

2000 - Present (26 years)

Michael Cowley FTSE is an Australian physiologist. He is best known for his mapping of the neural circuits involved in metabolism and obesity and diabetes treatment. He is a professor in the Department of Physiology at Monash University in the Faculty of Biomedical and Psychological Sciences. He is also a director of the Australian diabetes drug development company, Verva Inc, and director of the Monash Obesity & Diabetes Institute] .

#5598

Frank Kirchhoff

#106097

Overall Influence

1961 - Present (65 years)

#5599

Keith P. Klugman

#106109

Overall Influence

#5600

Patrick J. Casey

Patrick J. Casey

#74946

Overall Influence

Patrick J. Casey is a biochemist and molecular pharmacologist and is a James B. Duke Professor of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology at Duke University School of Medicine. In 2005, he relocated to Singapore to help found the Duke-NUS Medical School Singapore, where he served as its Senior Vice Dean of Research through July, 2023.

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