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,
#7451
David Grahame. Grahame-smith
#122103
Overall Influence
#7452
David E. Metzler
#122112
Overall Influence
#7453
Ned H. Kalin
#122122
Overall Influence
#7454
Sergio E. Starkstein
#122124
Overall Influence
#7455
Peter M. Haugan
#105670
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (68 years)
Peter Mosby Haugan is a Norwegian Scientist and Director of the Geophysical Institute, University of Bergen. His research includes various aspects of physical oceanography focusing on the North Sea and Arctic Ocean. His research is often featured in the Journal of Geophysical Research as well as in Cicerone, a climate magazine published by CICERO - Center for International Climate and Environmental Research Oslo.
Go to Profile#7456
Alun Davies
#100435
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (71 years)
Alun Millward Davies FRS FRSE FLSW FMedSci is a Welsh biologist, Distinguished Research Professor, School of Biosciences, Cardiff University, since 2004.
Go to Profile#7457
Kim James Burchiel
#122130
Overall Influence
#7458
Jacqueline C. M. Witteman
#122152
Overall Influence
#7459
George W. Chang
#81692
Overall Influence
George W. Chang is a professor and a resident faculty member at the University of California, Berkeley. He resides on campus with his wife Abby, while he is currently an Associate Professor Emeritus in the Department of Nutritional Sciences and Toxicology.
Go to Profile#7460
John Robert Hobbs
#122195
Overall Influence
#7461
Iris Sommer
#98902
Overall Influence
1970 - Present (56 years)
Iris Sommer is a Dutch psychiatrist who is professor of cognitive aspects of neurological and psychiatric disorders at the Departments of Neuroscience of University Medical Center Groningen. She previously served as Professor of Psychiatry at the University Medical Center Utrecht beginning in 2011. She received her PhD cum laude from Utrecht University in 2004. She was elected as a member of the Young Academy of the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences. She and her husband, Robert Schoevers, have two children.
Go to Profile#7462
Rejji Kuruvilla
#101253
Overall Influence
Rejji Kuruvilla is an Indian-American biologist. She is a professor of biology at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Education Kuruvilla completed a bachelor of science at St. Xavier's College, Kolkata in 1987. In 1998, she earned a doctor of philosophy at University of Houston. Her dissertation was titled "Studies on arachidonic acid depletion in diabetic rat nerve and human Schwann cells cultured in elevated glucose." Her doctoral advisor was Joseph Eichberg. Kuruvilla completed postdoctoral research on neurotrophin signaling in sympathetic neurons at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in the l...
Go to Profile#7463
Julian N. Kanfer
#122209
Overall Influence
#7464
Christian Overgaard Nielsen
#119225
Overall Influence
1918 - 1999 (81 years)
Christian Overgaard Nielsen was a Danish zoologist and ecologist. Biography Overgaard Nielsen was born at Snejbjerg in Herning, Denmark. He earned his Masters of Science degree in Anatomy during 1943.
Go to Profile#7465
Jason P. Sheehan
#122228
Overall Influence
#7466
Shimon Slavin
#122229
Overall Influence
#7467
Ross L. Coppel
#122236
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (74 years)
#7468
Leif Andersson
#111409
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (72 years)
Leif Andersson is a Swedish animal geneticist and professor of functional genomics at Uppsala University. In 2014, he won the Wolf Prize in Agriculture alongside Jorge Dubcovsky. He was inducted into the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in 2002 and is a foreign member of the National Academy of Sciences. He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 2017.
Go to Profile#7469
Dominique F. Figarella-branger
#122257
Overall Influence
#7470
Mark C. Urban
#68566
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
Mark C. Urban is a biologist and associate professor in ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Connecticut. His work focuses on the ecological and evolutionary mechanisms that shape natural communities across multiple spatial scales.
Go to Profile#7471
David J. Bottjer
#122277
Overall Influence
1951 - Present (75 years)
#7472
John A. Barron
#122301
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (79 years)
#7473
Donald James Tindall
#122310
Overall Influence
#7474
Dennis vanEngelsdorp
#97265
Overall Influence
1969 - Present (57 years)
Dennis vanEngelsdorp is an associate professor of entomology at the University of Maryland, College Park. He is the Chief Scientist for the Bee Informed Partnership and has been involved in a number of studies aimed at understanding colony collapse disorder. VanEngelsdorp was formerly the chief apiarist for Pennsylvania. He was married to H. G. Carrillo, a professor of English at George Washington University, until Carrillo's death of COVID-19 in April 2020.
Go to Profile#7475
Elizabeth C. Theil
#83898
Overall Influence
1936 - Present (90 years)
Elizabeth C. Theil is an American biochemist who worked on iron biology. She became the first woman to be appointed to a chaired professorship at North Carolina State University, in 1988; in the same year she received the O. Max Gardner Award of the University of North Carolina.
Go to Profile#7476
Thomas J. Spencer
#122351
Overall Influence
#7477
Lindsey Robert Baden
#122358
Overall Influence
#7478
Maureen Neitz
#69456
Overall Influence
Maureen E. Neitz is an American vision scientist whose research includes work on color vision and color blindness and the prevention of nearsightedness. She holds the Ray H. Hill Endowed Chair in Ophthalmology at the University of Washington.
Go to Profile#7479
George Chaldakov
#67451
Overall Influence
1940 - Present (86 years)
George Nikov Chaldakov born February 23, 1940, in Burgas, Bulgaria, is a Bulgarian vascular biologist well known for his contributions to the study of secretory function of vascular smooth muscle cells, and the role of neurotrophins and perivascular adipose tissue in pathogenesis of atherosclerosis. He published the first Bulgarian textbook of Cell Biology in 1996 and in 2005 founded the Bulgarian Society for Cell Biology.
Go to Profile#7480
Ross H. Arnett Jr.
#109176
Overall Influence
1919 - 1999 (80 years)
Ross Harold Arnett Jr. was an American entomologist noted for his studies of beetles, and as founder of the Coleopterist's Bulletin. Born in Medina, New York, he was a star student at Cornell University, where he became interested in beetles and started on a revision of the Nearctic Silphidae. He graduated in 1942, the same year that he married his high school sweetheart Mary Ennis.
Go to Profile#7481
Kalanit Grill-Spector
#87933
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
Kalanit Grill-Spector is a professor of Psychology at Stanford University and the Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute at Stanford University. She is best known for developing fMRI adaptation, a technique useful for studying the sensitivity of neurons in the brain to changes of a stimulus.
Go to Profile#7482
Kang-sen Mai
#122387
Overall Influence
#7483
Rutger Rosenberg
#122390
Overall Influence
#7484
Alan Gelperin
#86850
Overall Influence
1941 - Present (85 years)
Dr. Alan Gelperin is a scientist and biologist currently at Princeton University. He is an emeritus faculty member at Monell Chemical Senses Center. He specializes in electronic olfaction and computational neuroscience. He received his bachelor's degree in biology from Carleton College in 1962 and went on to get a Ph.D. from University of Pennsylvania.
Go to Profile#7485
Angelika Brandt
#109980
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (65 years)
Angelika Brandt is the world leader in Antarctic deep-sea biodiversity and has developed, organised and led several oceanographic expeditions to Antarctica, notably the series of ANDEEP cruises, which have contributed significantly to Antarctica and deep-sea biology. Brandt was the senior scientist of ANDEEP which was devoted entirely to benthic research in the Antarctic abyss.
Go to Profile#7486
Rosie Bradshaw
#58718
Overall Influence
Rosemary E. Bradshaw is a New Zealand mycologist, as of 2019 full professor of genetics at the Massey University. Academic career After a 1983 PhD titled 'Hybridization of Aspergillus species' at the University of Nottingham, Bradshaw moved to the Massey University, rising to full professor in 2016.
Go to Profile#7487
Armen Trchounian
#63038
Overall Influence
1956 - 2020 (64 years)
Armen Trchounian was an Armenian biophysicist. D.Sc. in Biological sciences and professor , Corresponding Member of NAS RA and Head of the Department of Biochemistry, Microbiology, and Biotechnology of Yerevan State University .
Go to Profile#7488
Phillip K. Peterson
#122407
Overall Influence
#7489
Patrick T. K. Woo
#122409
Overall Influence
#7490
Jean Lud Cadet
#85285
Overall Influence
Jean Lud Cadet is a Haitian-American psychiatrist at the National Institute on Drug Abuse , where he serves as National Institutes of Health Chief of the Molecular Neuropsychiatry Research Branch. His research considers the genetic, epigenetic and cellular bases of substance abuse. In 2020 he was selected as one of Cell Press' Most Inspiring Black Scientists in America.
Go to Profile#7491
John Berry
#79210
Overall Influence
1907 - 2002 (95 years)
John Berry, CBE DL FRSE was a Scottish zoologist and ecologist. He was the first Director of the Nature Conservancy for Scotland . He was the youngest and longest served Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh during the 20th century.
Go to Profile#7492
John F. Eisenberg
#111506
Overall Influence
1935 - 2003 (68 years)
John Frederick Eisenberg was an American zoologist. Biography Eisenberg was born in 1935, in Everett, Washington. As a boy, he trapped and studied rodents, which intrigued him, so he decided to obtain a scholarship to study zoology at a university. He graduated from Washington State University and earned his master's and doctorate degrees in zoology at the University of California in Berkeley. In 1965, he took a position at the National Zoo and also taught graduate courses at the University of Maryland University of Maryland. He left the zoo in 1982, when he was the zoo's assistant director, to take a position teaching at the University of Florida University of Florida.
Go to Profile#7493
Shamshad Cockcroft
#85808
Overall Influence
Shamshad Cockcroft is a British physiologist and a professor of cell physiology in the Neuro, Physiology and Pharmacology Division of Biosciences at the UCL. She has been a member of The Physiological Society since 1989.
Go to Profile#7494
Kirstin Matthews
#64761
Overall Influence
Kirstin Matthews is a Fellow in Science and Technology Policy at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy. Matthews received a bachelor's degree in biochemistry from the University of Texas at Austin and a PhD in molecular biology from the University of Texas Health Science Center. Matthews has published multiple policy recommendations pertaining to stem cell research, climate change, and health care.
Go to Profile#7495
Ronnie D. Green
#72857
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (65 years)
Ronnie David Green served as the 20th chancellor of the University of Nebraska–Lincoln from 2016 to 2023. UNL is the state's flagship, a land-grant university, and is part of the University of Nebraska system. Green previously led the university's Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources from 2010 to 2016, and served as interim Senior Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, the university's highest academic office, from 2015 to 2016.
Go to Profile#7496
Robert S. Adelstein
#122457
Overall Influence
#7497
Kristin Hogquist
#120155
Overall Influence
Kristin Ann Hogquist is an American immunologist. She holds the David M. Brown Endowed Professorship and is Associate Director of the Center for Immunology at the University of Minnesota. Early life and education Hogquist was born and raised in Minnesota. While earning her Bachelor of Arts degree at St. Catherine University, Hogquist was a member of Phi Beta Kappa and recipient of the Tozer Scholarship. After graduating in 1983, she earned the National Science Foundation Fellowship and completed her PhD from Washington University.
Go to Profile#7498
Robert Lee Grossman
#57233
Overall Influence
1957 - Present (69 years)
#7499
Carola Garcia de Vinuesa
#76556
Overall Influence
1969 - Present (57 years)
Carola Garcia de Vinuesa is a Spanish doctor, scientist, and professor. She is Royal Society Wolfson Fellow and Senior Group Leader at the Francis Crick Institute in London, and at the John Curtin School of Medical Research in Canberra. She is a winner of the Australian Science Minister's Prize for Life Scientist of the Year and the Gottschalk Medal.
Go to Profile#7500
Gene Brown
#110729
Overall Influence
1926 - 2017 (91 years)
Gene Monte Brown was a Professor Emeritus of Biochemistry at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He joined the department in 1954 and served as its head from 1977 to 1985. He served as the dean of science at MIT from 1985 to 1991. He is notable for his interest in and commitment to undergraduate education, and taught the department's biochemistry course for over 50 years.
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