The Most Influential People Across History
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).
Methodology: How and Why We Rank by Influence …
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List of the most influential people in Biology,
#6201
Hans-joerg Vogel
#111532
Overall Influence
#6202
Yûichi Yamamura
#111544
Overall Influence
#6203
Brigitte Kieffer
#89586
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (68 years)
Dr. Brigitte Kieffer is a French molecular neurobiologist known for her research of opiate receptors. Her areas of expertise include: molecular psychiatry, addiction, mood disorders, pain, and developmental disorders. Kieffer has international reputation in the field of opiate receptors, and has paved the way for better understanding of brain mechanisms involved in pain, mental illness, and drug addiction. She continues to pursue research and directs a team of over 300 people. Her discoveries have shed light on how substances like morphine or heroin can kill pain, and foster addiction.
Go to Profile#6204
Mary F. Dallman
#111590
Overall Influence
#6205
Jane Fromont
#99612
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
Phyllis Jane Fromont is a New Zealand and Australian scientist specialising in sponges. Early life and education Fromont was raised in Whanganui, New Zealand, the youngest of six children. She became interested in marine biology after scuba diving in Northland, and completed a Bachelor of Science degree that included some marine biology papers at the University of Auckland. She then undertook her overseas experience for about two years, before arriving in Perth, Western Australia, where she found work with an environmental consultancy firm and was a volunteer at the Western Australian Museum with curator of marine invertebrates, Loisette Marsh.
Go to Profile#6206
Amalio Telenti
#111600
Overall Influence
#6207
T. Nakamura
#111606
Overall Influence
#6208
Joy Zedler
#90891
Overall Influence
1943 - Present (83 years)
Joy Buswell Zedler is an American ecologist and professor of botany at the University of Wisconsin–Madison , holding the title of Aldo Leopold Chair of Restoration Ecology. In addition to restoration ecology, she specializes in the ecology of wetlands, rare species, interactions between native and introduced species, and adaptive management.
Go to Profile#6209
Michèle Ramsay
#79261
Overall Influence
Michèle Ramsay is a South African Professor of human genetics at the National Health Laboratory Service and the University of the Witwatersrand. Ramsay's research has investigated single-gene disorders, epigenetics, obesity and hypertension. She was the President of the African Society of Human Genetics from 2014 until 2019.
Go to Profile#6210
Murray Korc
#111613
Overall Influence
#6211
J. Jerry Kaneko
#111621
Overall Influence
#6212
Lukas Hottinger
#97130
Overall Influence
1933 - 2011 (78 years)
Lukas Hottinger was a paleontologist, biologist and geologist. Hottinger collaborated with the Natural History Museum of Basel . Hottinger was one of the major experts on present-day and fossil larger foraminifera. In 1997 he obtained the Cushman Award from the Cushman Foundation for Foraminiferal Research for his lifetime contributions to foraminiferal research. Professor Hottinger completed his PhD thesis on Paleocene and Eocene Alveolina in 1959 under the direction of Professor Manfred Reichel. His thesis on Paleogene Alveolina included genus and species definitions and changes through time, the concept of phylogenetic lineages, and their use in zonal biochronology.
Go to Profile#6213
Peter Wyse Jackson
#63581
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (71 years)
Peter Sherlock Wyse Jackson is an Irish botanist and environmentalist. He is president of the Missouri Botanical Garden, and holder of the George Engelmann chair in botany at Washington University in St. Louis.
Go to Profile#6214
Martin Turner
#108655
Overall Influence
1963 - Present (63 years)
Martin Turner is a molecular biologist and Immunologist and Head of the Immunology Programme at the Babraham Institute. His work has helped identify key molecular processes involved in the development of the immune system and its response to pathogens. His work has included research the fundamental mechanisms regulating gene expression by cells of the immune system.
Go to Profile#6215
Uma Ramakrishnan
#92430
Overall Influence
Uma Ramakrishnan is an Indian molecular ecologist and professor at National Centre for Biological Sciences , Bangalore. Her research investigates population genetics and evolutionary history of mammals in the Indian subcontinent, including work to save India’s tigers. In July 2019, she was elected as a fellow to the Indian National Science Academy.
Go to Profile#6216
J. William. Lown
#111655
Overall Influence
#6217
Ernst H. Beutner
#101914
Overall Influence
1923 - 2013 (90 years)
Ernst H. Beutner was a German-born microbiologist who discovered the role of autoimmunity in pemphigus and pemphigoid using self-designed immunofluorescent methods. For this achievement, he is often regarded as the "Founder of Immunodermatology". He was the author or co-author of over 10 papers, which were each cited over 100 times.
Go to Profile#6218
Jennifer Rohn
#83360
Overall Influence
1967 - Present (59 years)
Jennifer Leigh Rohn is a British-American scientist and novelist. She is a cell biologist at University College London, editor of the webzine LabLit.com and founder of the Science is Vital organization that campaigns against cuts to the public funding of science in the United Kingdom.
Go to Profile#6219
Dianne Newman
#65854
Overall Influence
1972 - Present (54 years)
Dianne Newman is a molecular microbiologist, a professor in the Division of Biology and Biological Engineering and the Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences at California Institute of Technology. Her research interests include bioenergetics and cell biology of metabolically diverse, genetically-tractable bacteria. Her work deals with electron-transfer reactions that are part of the metabolism of microorganisms.
Go to Profile#6220
H. Bryan S. Womersley
#111669
Overall Influence
#6221
Case Vanderwolf
#66467
Overall Influence
1935 - 2015 (80 years)
Cornelius Hendrik "Case" Vanderwolf was a Canadian neuroscientist. Raised in the rural community of Glenevis, Alberta, Vanderwolf went on to earn a BSc from the University of Alberta and completed graduate work with Donald Hebb at McGill University, completing his PhD in 1962 . Following completion of his PhD, Case spent a year at the California Institute of Technology with Roger Sperry and another year with Konrad Akert, the Founder of the Brain Research Institute of the University of Zurich .
Go to Profile#6222
Cédric Blanpain
#82331
Overall Influence
1970 - Present (56 years)
Cédric Blanpain is a Belgian researcher in the field of stem cells . He is a tenured professor of developmental biology and genetics at Université Libre de Bruxelles and director of the stem cell and cancer lab at its Faculty of Medicine. He was one of the first researchers in the world to use cell lineage tracing in cancer research and he showed for the first time the existence of cancer stem cells in solid tumors in vivo. He was selected by Nature as one of 10 People who mattered most in 2012 and he received the outstanding young investigator award of the International Society for Stem Cell...
Go to Profile#6223
Robert Morgan Fink
#106772
Overall Influence
1915 - 2012 (97 years)
Robert Morgan Fink was an American biochemist who was a professor at University of California, Los Angeles. He and his wife Kathryn Ferguson Fink, also a biochemist, collaborated to develop techniques in nuclear medicine used for radiolabeling in the study of thyroid cancer treatment.
Go to Profile#6224
Anne Churchland
#42596
Overall Influence
Anne K. Churchland is a neuroscientist at University of California, Los Angeles. Her laboratory studies the function of the posterior parietal cortex in cognitive processes such as decision-making and multisensory integration. One of her discoveries is that individual neurons in rodent posterior parietal cortex can multitask i.e. play a role in multiple behaviors. Another discovery is that rodents are similar to humans in their ability to perform multisensory integration, i.e. to integrate stimuli from two different modalities such as vision and hearing.
Go to Profile#6225
Seung-Yong Seong
#90756
Overall Influence
1965 - Present (61 years)
Seung-Yong Seong is a South Korean immunologist and microbiologist known for his study of innate immune system response and his development of the damage-associated molecular pattern model of immune response initiation in collaboration with Polly Matzinger. Seong is also known for his research on the bacterium Orientia tsutsugamushi and his research on immunological adjuvant when he was a student. Since 2013 he has served as Director of the Wide River Institute of Immunology – Seoul National University in conjunction with his Professor position in the Microbiology and Immunology department of Seoul National University College of Medicine.
Go to Profile#6226
Anna Wald
#107435
Overall Influence
Anna Wald is an American epidemiologist and clinical virology researcher. She is the Head of the Division of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the University of Washington School of Medicine . Education Wald attended Wesleyan University for her Bachelor of Arts degree, where she was encouraged by a professor to apply to medical school. Wald agreed and graduated from Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai with her MD degree in 1985. During her doctoral residency, she worked in inner-city hospitals and AIDS clinics. She moved to Seattle in 1989 and was hired by doctors Ann Collier and Lawrence...
Go to Profile#6227
Stanislas Lyonnet
#97474
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (68 years)
Stanislas Lyonnet is a French geneticist. As of 2012 he was Professor of genetics at Paris Descartes University, and a clinical geneticist in the Department of Medical Genetics at the Hôpital Necker - Enfants Malades. His research is aimed at isolating the genes that cause congenital malformation and birth defects.
Go to Profile#6228
Kenneth D. Aldape
#111754
Overall Influence
#6229
Barbara Cannon
#111758
Overall Influence
1946 - Present (80 years)
#6230
Faten Zahran Mohammed
#86211
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (71 years)
Faten Zahran Mohammed is an Egyptian biochemist and environmental biologist, cancer biologist and toxicologist known for her work on the anti-tumoral effects of snake venom and iodoacetate. She is currently Professor of Biochemistry at Zagazig University, Egypt, head of the Biochemistry Division, Faculty of Science, and a member of Egyptian Universities Promotion Committees "EUPC".
Go to Profile#6231
Aron K. Barbey
#59030
Overall Influence
1977 - Present (49 years)
Aron Keith Barbey is an American cognitive neuroscientist, who investigates the neural architecture of human intelligence and brain plasticity. Barbey is the Emanuel Donchin Professorial Scholar of Psychology and a Professor of Psychology, Neuroscience, and Bioengineering at the University of Illinois. He is director of the Decision Neuroscience Laboratory at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, and founding director of the Center for Brain Plasticity at the Beckman Institute, where he leads the Intelligence, Learning, and Plasticity Initiative.
Go to Profile#6232
John Wayne Mason
#70731
Overall Influence
1924 - 2014 (90 years)
John Wayne Mason, M.D. was an American physiologist and researcher who specialized in the interplay between human emotions and the endocrine system. Mason is regarded as an international leader and theoretician in the field of stress research, where he was one of the field's most prominent voices speaking out against the reigning model of stress promoted by Hans Selye.
Go to Profile#6233
David Richard Idler
#111797
Overall Influence
#6234
Daniel X. Freedman
#66963
Overall Influence
1921 - 1993 (72 years)
Daniel Xander Freedman was a psychiatrist and educator, pioneer in biological psychiatry. Biography Born in Lafayette, Indiana, he performed pioneering studies in the relationship between drugs and behavior. Researching brain mechanism in allergy, he discovered the link of hallucinogens to brain transmitters. He also found biological effects of environmental stress on the brain, and identified hyperserotonemia in autism.
Go to Profile#6235
Carla Penz
#66120
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (65 years)
Carla Maria Penz is a butterfly comparative morphologist and systematist, and the Doris Zemurray Stone Chair in Biodiversity at the University of New Orleans. Her research also focuses on natural history and behavior, mostly of neotropical butterflies.
Go to Profile#6236
Erwin Suess
#111806
Overall Influence
#6237
Julia Vorholt
#87618
Overall Influence
1969 - Present (57 years)
Julia A. Vorholt is a full professor of microbiology at ETH Zurich and an elected member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina. Biography She earned her PhD in 1997 under professor Rudolf K. Thauer at the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, for which she was awarded the Otto Hahn Medal, and is a German national residing in Switzerland. Following her Ph.D., she was a postdoctoral researcher with Mary Lidstrom at the University of Washington.
Go to Profile#6238
Wong Siew Te
#81096
Overall Influence
1969 - Present (57 years)
Wong Siew Te is a Malaysian wildlife biologist known for his studies on the Malayan sun bear and the foundation of the Bornean Sun Bear Conservation Centre in Sandakan, Sabah. Biography Wong Siew Te was born in Bukit Mertajam, Penang on 16 May 1969 as the youngest son of the tailor Wong Soon Kew, who operated the business "Soon Kew Tailor" in Bukit Mertajam from the 1950s to the mid-1980s. He grew up with eight other siblings – four elder brothers and four elder sisters. From 1976 to 1982 he joined Kim Sen Primary School in Bukit Mertajam and from 1982 to 1987 the Jit Sin High School, also in...
Go to Profile#6239
Paul E. Garfinkel
#111826
Overall Influence
#6240
Clark Hubbs
#86111
Overall Influence
1921 - 2008 (87 years)
Clark Hubbs was an American ichthyologist who was professor of zoology at the University of Texas from 1963 until he accepted emeritus status in 1991. He was a leading figure in ichthyology in Texas, teaching many students who went on to be renowned in the field, was actively involved in many ichthyological societies and was an editor of scientific journals. Hubbs was also an environmental activist, fighting to conserve freshwater ecosystems.
Go to Profile#6241
Richard Scott Jope
#111834
Overall Influence
#6242
Monika Hilker
#91258
Overall Influence
1959 - Present (67 years)
Monika Hilker is a biologist and a professor at the Freie Universität Berlin. She leads the Applied Zoology/Animal Ecology working group at the Freie Universität, studying the chemical and molecular ecology of plant-insect interactions. She is also the speaker and director of the Collaborative Research Centre 973 "Priming and Memory of Organismic Responses to Stress".
Go to Profile#6243
Reed Brendon Wickner
#111863
Overall Influence
#6244
Hiroshi Nishiura
#111878
Overall Influence
#6245
Mark Achtman
#96168
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
Mark Achtman FRS is Professor of Bacterial Population Genetics at Warwick Medical School, part of the University of Warwick in the UK. Education Achtman was educated at the University of Manitoba where he was awarded a Master of Science degree in 1965 for research on hemagglutination in adenovirus. He went on to complete a PhD on bacterial fertility factor at the University of California, Berkeley in 1969.
Go to Profile#6246
Jeanne Loring
#95725
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Jeanne Frances Loring is an American stem cell biologist, developmental neurobiologist, and geneticist. She is the founding Director of the Center for Regenerative Medicine and emeritus professor at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California. She has founded two biotechnology companies, Arcos BioScience and Aspen Neuroscience
Go to Profile#6247
Edgar G. Engleman
#98747
Overall Influence
Edgar G. Engleman is an American pathologist and physician-scientist who researches cancer immunology. He is a professor of pathology and of medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine. He is also a co-founder of Vivo Capital, a Healthcare Investment firm.
Go to Profile#6248
John S. Rodwell
#96670
Overall Influence
1946 - Present (80 years)
John S. Rodwell is an ecologist who was based at the University of Lancaster, noted for his role in the development of the British National Vegetation Classification and as editor of the five volumes of British Plant Communities.
Go to Profile#6249
Ulf Stenevi
#111928
Overall Influence
#6250
David C. Cannatella
#107946
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (72 years)
David C. Cannatella is an American herpetologist, systematist, zoologist, and professor of integrative biology at the University of Texas at Austin. Cannatella earned a Bachelor of Science degree at the University of Southwestern Louisiana in 1976. He then studied systematics and ecology at the University of Kansas, receiving his Ph.D. under the supervision of Linda Trueb in 1985. His dissertation was on the phylogeny of primitive frogs .
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