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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Person Name

School

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Discipline

Subdiscipline

Ranking

List of the most influential people in Biology,

#6251

Paul Gordon Jarvis

Paul Gordon Jarvis

#103359

Overall Influence

1935 - 2013 (78 years)

Paul Gordon Jarvis was a leading ecologist and Professor of Forestry and Natural Resources at the University of Edinburgh from 1975 to 2001. Education Jarvis was educated at Oriel College, Oxford graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Botany. He went to graduate school at the University of Sheffield where he was awarded a PhD in 1960 for research on the growth and regeneration of Irish oak Quercus petraea. Funded by a NATO scholarship, he moved to Uppsala University where he was awarded a second doctorate in plant physiology in 1963.

#6252

Carla Green

#107504

Overall Influence

1962 - Present (64 years)

Carla Beth Green is an American neurobiologist and chronobiologist. She is a professor in the Department of Neuroscience and a Distinguished Scholar in Neuroscience at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center. She is the former president of the Society for Research on Biological Rhythms , as well as a satellite member of the International Institute for Integrative Sleep Medicine at the University of Tsukuba in Japan.

#6253

William H. Gerwick

#111967

Overall Influence

#6254

Peter Huttenlocher

#76190

Overall Influence

1931 - 2013 (82 years)

Peter Richard Huttenlocher was a German-American pediatric neurologist and neuroscientist who discovered how the brain develops in children. He is considered to be one of the fathers of developmental cognitive neuroscience.

#6255

Levon Harutyunyan

Levon Harutyunyan

#106985

Overall Influence

1927 - 2007 (80 years)

Levon Vrami Harutyunyan was an Armenian biologist, University Professor, journalist, publicist, writer and science populariser, founder of Yerevan Haybusak University. Established in 1990, the Haybusak University became one of the first private universities in Armenia. He received numerous decorations for his work including Anania Shirakatsi medal from the President of Armenia.

#6256

John G. Nutt

#112031

Overall Influence

#6257

Michael R. Duchen

#112042

Overall Influence

#6258

Timothy Hla

#112056

Overall Influence

#6259

R. Scott Hawley

R. Scott Hawley

#101362

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (73 years)

R. Scott Hawley is an American geneticist and investigator at the Stowers Institute for Medical Research in Kansas City, Missouri, a member of the US National Academy of sciences and fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He has been President of the Genetics Society of America, and leads a research team focused on the molecular mechanisms that regulate chromosome behavior during meiosis.

#6260

Cheng-Ming Chuong

#97449

Overall Influence

1952 - Present (74 years)

Cheng-Ming Chuong is a Taiwanese-American biomedical scientist. Education and personal life He is a professor of pathology in University of Southern California, and academician of Academia Sinica in Taiwan. Chuong grew up in Taipei, Taiwan and graduated from Department of Medicine, Taiwan University in 1978. He then went to the Rockefeller University to pursue Ph.D. degree, where he studied neural cell adhesion molecules and pattern formation with Gerald M. Edelman. He received Ph.D. in 1983, and stayed as an assistant professor in the Rockefeller University till 1987. With Edelman, he worked...

#6261

Zhi‐feng Yang

#112085

Overall Influence

#6262

Elias Arnér

#101375

Overall Influence

1966 - Present (60 years)

Elias Arnér is a Swedish professor in biochemistry active in the fields of redox biology and cancer research. He studied medicine at Karolinska Institutet and became a medical doctor in 1997. He received his Ph.D. in 1993 from Karolinska Institutet on the subject of nucleoside analogues in relation to cancer and HIV treatment. He moved to Munich, Germany where he started focusing on selenoproteins. He returned to Karolinska Institutet where he became associate professor in 2000 and appointed professor in 2009. He is head of the biochemistry division in the department of medical biochemistry and biophysics at Karolinska Institutet.

#6263

Johannes Hebebrand

#112106

Overall Influence

#6264

Lenore Terr

#23173

Overall Influence

1936 - Present (90 years)

Lenore C. Terr is a psychiatrist and author known for her research into childhood trauma. Terr graduated from the University of Michigan Medical School with an MD. She is the winner of the Blanche Ittleson Award for her research on childhood trauma. Terr is noted for her work studying the after-effects of the 1976 Chowchilla kidnapping on the 26 children who were buried alive for 16 hours after being kidnapped from a bus.

#6265

Jane A. Langdale

#98097

Overall Influence

1960 - Present (66 years)

Jane Alison Langdale, is a British geneticist and academic. She is Professor of Plant Development in the Department of Biology at the University of Oxford and a Professorial Fellow at The Queen's College, Oxford.

#6266

Padmanabhan Balaram

#17257

Overall Influence

1949 - Present (77 years)

Padmanabhan Balaram is an Indian biochemist and a former director of the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore, India. He is a recipient of the third highest Indian civilian honour of Padma Bhushan as well as the TWAS Prize . He has been conferred the 2021 R. Bruce Merrifield Award by the American Peptide Society.

#6267

Muireann Irish

#68160

Overall Influence

Muireann Irish is a cognitive neuropsychologist at the Brain and Mind Centre at the University of Sydney. She has won international and national awards, including an Australian Research Council Future Fellowship and L’Oreal-UNESCO For Women in Science Fellowship.

#6268

Christian Peter Kubicek

#112155

Overall Influence

#6269

Matthias Meyer

#82952

Overall Influence

Matthias Meyer is a German evolutionary geneticist working primarily with ancient DNA. Meyer is the leader of the Advanced DNA sequencing techniques group at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.

#6270

Alon Chen

#39519

Overall Influence

1970 - Present (56 years)

Alon Chen is an Israeli neuroscientist and the 11th President of the Weizmann Institute of Science. Biography Chen was born in Israel. He is a neuroscientist. He attended Ben-Gurion University of the Negev , and the Weizmann Institute of Science . On a Rothschild scholarship and a Fulbright scholarship, Chen conducted postdoctoral research at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in San Diego, California, from 2001–05.

#6271

John A. H. Wass

#112206

Overall Influence

#6272

David Templeton Gibson

#112215

Overall Influence

#6273

Frances Cress Welsing

Frances Cress Welsing

#16825

Overall Influence

1935 - 2016 (81 years)

Frances Luella Welsing was an American psychiatrist and well-known proponent of the black supremacist melanin theory. Her 1970 essay, The Cress Theory of Color-Confrontation and Racism , offered her interpretation of what she described as the origins of white supremacy culture.

#6274

Alex J. Van Der Eb

#112241

Overall Influence

#6275

John Barr Cavanagh

#112247

Overall Influence

#6276

Edward Rubin

#102722

Overall Influence

Edward Rubin is the chief scientific officer at Metabiota, a company that works on epidemic risk and infectious diseases. From 2002 to 2016, he was a researcher at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the director of the Department of Energy's Joint Genome Institute. In 2012, he was named the Charles J. and Lois B. Epstein Visiting Professor at the University of California San Francisco.

#6277

Werner Jaffé

#52266

Overall Influence

1914 - 2009 (95 years)

Werner Gunter Jaffé Fellner was a chemist and university professor. Jaffé was born in Frankfurt as a child of Rudolf Jaffé. He received his doctoral degree at the University of Zurich under the supervision of the Nobel Prize winner Paul Karrer. After graduating, Jaffé arrived in Venezuela in 1940 and became a professor at the Central University of Venezuela. He started the teaching of Biochemistry at the Central University and founded the Instituto Nacional de Nutrición. He was cofounder of the Venezuelan Association for the Advancement of Science. in 1946 he received a grant from the Rockefe...

#6278

Daniel Voytas

#99854

Overall Influence

Daniel Voytas is an American geneticist who is Professor of Genetics, Cell Biology and Development at the University of Minnesota and Director of the Center for Precision Plant Genomics. He is also the Chief Scientific Officer of Calyxt, an agricultural biotechnology company focused on developing crops that provide consumer benefit.

#6279

Per Alf Brodal

#86808

Overall Influence

1944 - Present (82 years)

Per Alf Brodal is a Norwegian professor of medicine. He was born in Oslo. He was a son of professor of anatomy Alf Brodal, and thus a nephew of violinist Jon Brodal and psalm writer Anne Margarethe "Pus" Brodal.

#6280

Klaus Bendtzen

#112299

Overall Influence

#6281

Robin Franklin

#111587

Overall Influence

1962 - Present (64 years)

Robin Franklin, FRS is a British cell biologist and neuroscientist. He is currently a Principal Investigator at Altos Labs Cambridge Institute of Science having previously been Professor of Stem Cell Medicine at the Wellcome–MRC Cambridge Stem Cell Institute at the University of Cambridge. He is Emeritus Fellow of Pembroke College, Cambridge.

#6282

William T. Cefalu

#100345

Overall Influence

1954 - Present (72 years)

William T. Cefalu is an American physician-scientist. Cefalu is the chief scientific and medical officer of the American Diabetes Association. Education Cefalu completed a B.S. from Southeastern Louisiana University and an M.D. from LSU Health Sciences Center New Orleans in 1979. He was a resident in internal medicine and chief resident at University of California, Irvine, Veterans Affairs Long Beach Healthcare System. He conducted a fellowship in endocrinology at David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.

#6283

John I. Hedges

#112344

Overall Influence

1946 - 2022 (76 years)

#6284

Sergei Mirkin

#110599

Overall Influence

Sergei Mirkin is a Russian-American biologist who studies genome instability mediated by repetitive DNA during DNA replication and transcription. He is a professor of Genetics and Molecular Biology and holds the White Family Chair in Biology at Tufts University.

#6285

Michael John Brammer

#112350

Overall Influence

#6286

Judith H. Myers

Judith H. Myers

#100151

Overall Influence

1941 - Present (85 years)

Judith H. Myers is a Canadian-American ecologist. In 2014 she was elected president of the Canadian Society for Ecology and Evolution. Professor Myers is well known for her decades-long research into plant-animal-microbe interactions, including insect pest outbreaks, viral pathogens of insects, and pioneering work on biological control of insects and plants, particularly invasive species. Throughout her career she has advocated strongly for both the public understanding of science and for increasing the number of women in the STEM subjects: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.

#6287

Werner Müller-Esterl

#84517

Overall Influence

1948 - Present (78 years)

Werner Müller-Esterl is a German biochemist who served as president of the Goethe University Frankfurt from 2009 to 2014. Career Born in Bonn, he studied chemistry and medicine at the University of Bonn and the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. He obtained his medical license in 1979 and his habilitation in clinical biochemistry in 1985. In 1987 he became professor of clinical biochemistry in Munich. In 1989 he became professor of pathobiochemistry at the University of Mainz. In 1999 he became professor of biochemistry at the Goethe University. He was director of the Institute for Biochemistry II and the Gustav Embden Center for Biological Chemistry from 2000.

#6288

Gary Kobinger

#79436

Overall Influence

Gary P. Kobinger is a Canadian immunologist and virologist who is currently the director at the Galveston National Laboratory at the University of Texas. He has held previous professorships at Université Laval, the University of Manitoba, and the University of Pennsylvania. Additionally, he was the chief of the Special Pathogens Unit at the National Microbiology Laboratory of the Public Health Agency of Canada in Winnipeg, Manitoba, for eight years. Kobinger is known for his critical role in the development of both an effective Ebola vaccine and treatment. His work focuses on the developmen...

#6289

Rodrigo Bravo

#112382

Overall Influence

#6290

Thressa Campbell Stadtman

#112387

Overall Influence

#6291

Sarah Hobbie

#109097

Overall Influence

Sarah E. Hobbie is an American ecologist, currently at the University of Minnesota, a National Academy of Sciences Fellow for Ecology, Evolution and Behavior in 2014 and a formerly Minnesota McKnight Land-Grant Professor.

#6292

Samuel Williamson

#72052

Overall Influence

1939 - 2005 (66 years)

Samuel J. Williamson was an American physicist and neuroscientist. Williamson was a co-developer of magnetic source imaging , and used this technique throughout his life to visualize and study brain activity especially as it relates to vision and hearing. He published over 100 articles in the fields of biomagnetism and neuroscience. He received both his bachelor's degree in physics and his Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology , in 1961 and 1965 respectively. Dr. Williamson started his professional career at MIT's Francis Bitter National Magnet Laboratory as a staff scientist, and remained there until 1971 when he joined the physics department at New York University .

#6293

Margaret A. Palmer

#90864

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (76 years)

Margaret A. Palmer is a Distinguished University Professor in the Department of Entomology at the University of Maryland and director of the National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center . Palmer works on the restoration of streams and rivers, and is co-author of the book Foundations of Restoration Ecology. Palmer has been an invited speaker in numerous and diverse settings including regional and international forums, science-diplomacy venues , and popular outlets such as The Colbert Report.

#6294

Warwick F. Vincent

#112440

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (73 years)

#6295

Jesse D. Bloom

#104736

Overall Influence

Jesse D. Bloom is an American computational virologist and Professor in the Basic Sciences Division, the Public Health Sciences Division, and the Herbold Computational Biology Program, at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center. He is also an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and an Affiliate Professor in the University of Washington departments of Genome Sciences and Microbiology.

#6296

Thomas Croat

#100497

Overall Influence

1938 - Present (88 years)

Thomas Bernard Croat is an American botanist and plant collector, noteworthy as one of botanical history's "most prolific plant collectors". He has collected and described numerous species of plants, particularly in the family Araceae, in his career at the Missouri Botanical Garden.

#6297

Edward Thomas Ryan

Edward Thomas Ryan

#71596

Overall Influence

1962 - Present (64 years)

Edward Thomas Ryan is an American microbiologist, immunologist, and physician at Harvard University and Massachusetts General Hospital. Ryan served as president of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene from 2009 to 2010. Ryan is Professor of Immunology and Infectious Diseases at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, and Director of Global Infectious Diseases at the Massachusetts General Hospital. Ryan's research and clinical focus has been on infectious diseases associated with residing in, immigrating from, or traveling through resource-limited areas.

#6298

Pierre De Meyts

Pierre De Meyts

#104967

Overall Influence

1944 - Present (82 years)

Pierre De Meyts is a Belgian physician and biochemist known for his research on fine chemical and kinetic aspects of ligand-receptor interaction, subunit assembly, and specific metabolic effects of hormones typically causing receptor tyrosine kinase activation such as insulin and insulin-like growth factors . He has also studied receptor signalling for other peptide hormones such as growth hormone and relaxin, and key pathophysiological aspects of diabetes mellitus. De Meyts held professorial posts for over three decades at several European and United States institutions and currently is an emeritus professor in the Science Faculty at the Université catholique de Louvain.

#6299

Nancy Simmons

#90216

Overall Influence

1959 - Present (67 years)

Nancy B. Simmons is an American zoologist, mammalogist, professor, and author. Specializing in bats, Simmons has conducted extensive research on the morphology and evolutionary history of numerous bat species. She is also the curator-in-charge of the Department of Mammalogy at the American Museum of Natural History and a professor at the Richard Gilder Graduate School.

#6300

Edouard Bard

#57197

Overall Influence

1962 - Present (64 years)

Edouard Bard, born on September 1, 1962, is a French climatologist, Professor of Climate and Ocean Evolution at the Collège de France and a member of the French Academy of Sciences. Biography After studying geological engineering in Nancy, Edouard Bard began his research at the Commissariat à l'énergie atomique in Gif-sur-Yvette and continued at the Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University in New York as a postdoctoral fellow in 1988 and as an associate researcher in 1989. Back in France, he first joined the CEA as a researcher, then began teaching as a professor at the University of Aix-Marseille in 1991 and at the Collège de France in 2001.

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