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,
#8001
Grzegorz Bartosz
#126252
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
#8002
Charles H. Peterson
#126260
Overall Influence
#8003
Richard Karban
#126264
Overall Influence
#8004
Maria Yazdanbakhsh
#122571
Overall Influence
1959 - Present (67 years)
Maria Yazdanbakhsh is a Dutch immunologist who is Professor of Cellular Immunology of Parasitic Infections and Head of the Department of Parasitology at the Leiden University Medical Center. She was elected Fellow of the European Molecular Biology Organization in 2023.
Go to Profile#8005
Toshimichi Ikemura
#126284
Overall Influence
#8006
Pierre Wolkenstein
#126288
Overall Influence
#8007
John A. Cooper
#57237
Overall Influence
John Allen Cooper is an American biochemist. He is a Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics and of Cell Biology and Physiology at Washington University School of Medicine. He served as head of the university's Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics between 2015 and 2020 after leading the department as interim head.
Go to Profile#8008
Jawad Fares
#82563
Overall Influence
1991 - Present (35 years)
Jawad Youssef Fares is a Lebanese medical doctor, researcher and scientist. He was selected for the Forbes 30 Under 30 list in science and healthcare for his contribution to solving healthcare problems in the developing world. He also featured twice in the Forbes Middle East 30 Under 30, and was selected as one of the top 10 young scientists in the world by Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News. In 2019, Fares was elected as a Fellow of The World Academy of Medical Sciences, and in 2021 was one of the Young Physician Leaders selected by the InterAcademy Partnership .
Go to Profile#8009
Fernando T. Maestre
#126315
Overall Influence
1976 - Present (50 years)
#8010
E.l.izabeth A. Bernays
#126323
Overall Influence
#8011
Markus Göker
#126324
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
#8012
Carina M. Schlebusch
#89237
Overall Influence
Carina Maria Schlebusch is an evolutionary biologist at the University of Uppsala in Sweden. She is a specialist in the population history of Africa. In 2017 she was the co-author of a paper that suggested that modern humans emerged more than 300,000 years ago.
Go to Profile#8013
Peter J. Meier
#126330
Overall Influence
#8014
Stephan E. Mergenhagen
#126340
Overall Influence
#8015
Johannes E. De Vries
#126343
Overall Influence
#8016
John F. Greden
#126351
Overall Influence
#8017
Frank Dudbridge
#123997
Overall Influence
Frank Dudbridge is Professor of Statistical Genetics in the Department of Health Sciences at the University of Leicester, where he has worked since 2016. His research focuses on the fields of statistical genetics and genetic epidemiology as they relate to common human diseases. Before joining the University of Leicester, he served first as a senior statistician at the MRC Biostatistics Unit at the University of Cambridge, then as Reader and Professor of Statistical Genetics at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
Go to Profile#8018
Peter Molan
#114415
Overall Influence
1943 - 2015 (72 years)
Peter Charles Molan was a New Zealand biochemist, noted for his elucidation of the medicinal properties of mānuka honey. Early life and family Born in Cardiff, Wales, on 20 October 1943, Molan was the son of Vera Molan and her husband Charles Molan. In 1963 Molan married Winifred Ruth Whitcomb in Cardiff. They migrated to New Zealand with their four children in 1973, and became naturalised New Zealanders in 1977. Ruth Molan died in 1991, and Molan later remarried.
Go to Profile#8019
Colin Dawes
#126365
Overall Influence
#8020
John M. Sedivy
#108624
Overall Influence
John Michael Sedivy is the Hermon C. Bumpus Professor of Biology and a professor of Medical Science at Brown University. He is listed as a F1000 Prime faculty member and on Who's Who in Gerontology. He has published over 130 original articles.
Go to Profile#8021
Richard Glenn Fessler
#126370
Overall Influence
#8022
Mauro Giacca
#126374
Overall Influence
1959 - Present (67 years)
#8023
Heidi Wunderli-Allenspach
#29886
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (79 years)
Heidi Wunderli-Allenspach is a Swiss biologist and was the first female director of ETH Zürich. Life and work Wunderli-Allenspach was born in 1947 in Niederuzwil in the Canton of St. Gallen in Switzerland. She graduated with the master's degree in biology at ETH Zurich in 1970, and then she worked as a research assistant at the Institute for Brain Research at the University of Zurich. Thenafter she postgraduatedin Experimental Medicine and Biology at the University of Zurich. Wunderli subsequently did her Ph.D. thesis at the Department of Microbiology at the Biozentrum in Basel, and as resear...
Go to Profile#8024
Rexford F. Daubenmire
#126380
Overall Influence
#8025
N. W. Ferrante Kowall
#126387
Overall Influence
#8026
Jens Sandahl Christiansen
#126393
Overall Influence
#8027
Cynthia Bauerle
#107354
Overall Influence
Cynthia M. Bauerle is an American molecular biologist and college administrator. They are currently the interim vice provost for Faculty and Curriculum at James Madison University. Early life and education Bauerle is from Charlottesville, Virginia. They completed a B.A. in biology at University of Virginia in 1984 and a Ph.D. in molecular biology at University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1990. Bauerle was a postdoctoral fellow at University of Oregon where they researched molecular biology. They were a Fulbright scholar at University of Dar es Salaam from 1999 to 2000.
Go to Profile#8028
Wolfgang Maier
#95458
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (77 years)
Wolfgang Maier is a German psychiatrist and psychotherapist. Academic and professional career Wolfgang Maier first studied mathematics and economics at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, graduating with diplomas in 1973. That same year he started studying medicine, also at the University of Munich. In 1980 he received his doctorate in medicine. In 1981 he started working at the Psychiatric University Clinic Mainz, first as a clinical scientist and doctor, before being promoted to senior physician and later to chief senior physician. In 1990 he qualified as a professor for the medical field of psychiatry.
Go to Profile#8029
Stephen J. Marx
#126401
Overall Influence
#8030
Ross Hardison
#124170
Overall Influence
Ross C. Hardison is an American biochemist and molecular biologist, currently the T. Ming Chu Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the Eberly College of Science, of the Pennsylvania State University.
Go to Profile#8031
Jacqueline Chaparro Olaya
#112074
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Jacqueline Chaparro Olaya is a Colombian biologist and parasitologist, recipient of the L’Oréal-UNESCO for Women in Science grant in 2001 for her research on the application of molecular techniques in the field of infectious diseases.
Go to Profile#8032
Pertti A.j. Panula
#126421
Overall Influence
#8033
Erik M. Jorgensen
#72016
Overall Influence
Erik M. Jorgensen is an American biologist, currently teaching and running a microbiology and genetics lab at the University of Utah. He is a Distinguished Professor. He has been a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator since 2005.
Go to Profile#8034
Benson Ginsburg
#95705
Overall Influence
1918 - 2016 (98 years)
Benson Earl Ginsburg was an American behavior geneticist who taught at the University of Chicago and the University of Connecticut. He was a co-founder of the Behavior Genetics Association. Early life and education Ginsburg was born on July 16, 1918, in Detroit, Michigan. His parents, Sonia and Morris Ginsburg, were both recently arrived Jewish immigrants from Russia. He received his undergraduate education at Wayne State University, where he was originally a journalism major, before switching to majoring in English, and then becoming a biology major in the second semester of his junior year....
Go to Profile#8035
Torben Clausen
#126441
Overall Influence
#8036
Christopher S. Ogilvy
#126450
Overall Influence
#8037
Víctor Manuel Toledo
#86166
Overall Influence
1945 - Present (81 years)
Víctor Manuel Toledo Manzur is a Mexican biologist who served as Secretary of Environment and Natural Resources of Mexico from May 27, 2019 to September 2, 2020. This was his first public charge, although he had worked with President Andrés Manuel López Obrador since 2011.
Go to Profile#8038
Ziya Levent Gokaslan
#126465
Overall Influence
#8039
Kumar Krishna
#68146
Overall Influence
1928 - 2014 (86 years)
Kumar Krishna was an American entomologist of Indian origin. He was an expert on the termites and published the definitive systematic treatment of the termites of the world in a seven volume Treatise on the Isoptera of the world in 2013 written with collaborators.
Go to Profile#8040
Keith Anthony Josephs
#126479
Overall Influence
#8041
Gerald Salen
#126492
Overall Influence
#8042
Irwin Feinberg
#126499
Overall Influence
#8043
Howard Davis Thames
#126506
Overall Influence
#8044
Rick Alan Relyea
#126515
Overall Influence
#8045
A. Michael Denman
#126517
Overall Influence
#8046
JacSue Kehoe
#63736
Overall Influence
1935 - 2019 (84 years)
JacSue Kehoe was an American neuroscientist and neuroscience researcher. She spent decades working with the neurons of Aplysia californica, studying post-synaptic nerve response. She discovered that one neurotransmitter can have multiple types of receptors, which could vary in level and type of response. Kehoe worked for the Centre national de la recherche scientifique, where she made many other discoveries in neuroscience.
Go to Profile#8047
Bryan Alwyn Barlow
#109316
Overall Influence
1933 - Present (93 years)
Bryan Alwyn Barlow is an Australian botanist. He was a member of Committee of the "Flora of Australia" 1982–1984, and 1986–1988. He is a former director of the Australian National Herbarium . He authored many Myrtaceae, Loranthaceae and Viscaceae species.
Go to Profile#8048
Robert G. Cassens
#126525
Overall Influence
#8049
Charles E. Myers
#126540
Overall Influence
#8050
Stephen M. Beverley
#126543
Overall Influence
