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,
#8451
Barry W. Connors
#129636
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
#8452
Stephen Hugh Caldwell
#129640
Overall Influence
#8453
Ramin Mojtabai
#129647
Overall Influence
#8454
Martha J. Morrell
#129649
Overall Influence
#8455
Marnie Halpern
#116901
Overall Influence
Marnie Halpern is the Andrew J. Thomson Professor and Chair of molecular and systems biology at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College. She is a Pew Scholar in the Biomedical Sciences. and a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Go to Profile#8456
Nir Hacohen
#129654
Overall Influence
#8457
Terje Lømo
#129656
Overall Influence
#8458
Christina Grozinger
#119029
Overall Influence
1975 - Present (51 years)
Christina Grozinger is an American entomologist, the Publius Vergilius Maro Professor of Entomology at Pennsylvania State University and the director at its Center for Pollinator Research. Her main areas of expertise as a social insect biologist are the molecular, physiological, and ecological determinants that affect the health of honey bees and other pollinators. Grozinger has carried out important research into the ways in which bee stressors affect bees, and how factors such as climate change, extreme weather, pathogens, parasites, pesticides, and nutritional deficiencies are affecting worldwide pollinator decline.
Go to Profile#8459
Milan Chytrý
#129677
Overall Influence
1967 - Present (59 years)
#8460
David C Page
#129681
Overall Influence
#8461
Sue Clifford
#58581
Overall Influence
1944 - Present (82 years)
Susan Merlyn Clifford MBE co-founded Common Ground, a British organisation which campaigns to link nature with culture and the positive investment people can make in their own localities, with Angela King in 1983.
Go to Profile#8462
Federico Bussolino
#129697
Overall Influence
#8463
Alan I. Leshner
#129701
Overall Influence
#8464
Sheryl van Nunen
#91069
Overall Influence
Sheryl van Nunen OAM MBBS FRACP, is an Australian allergy researcher and Senior Staff Specialist in the Department of Clinical Immunology and Allergy at Royal North Shore Hospital in Sydney, Australia, and Clinical Associate Professor at the Sydney Medical School - Northern, University of Sydney.
Go to Profile#8465
Robert L. Vessella
#129718
Overall Influence
#8466
Klaus Winter
#129724
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (77 years)
#8467
Catherine Pringle
#124703
Overall Influence
Catherine Mann Pringle is a distinguished research professor at the Odum School of Ecology at the University of Georgia. She studies aquatic ecosystems and conservation. Pringle has previously served as president of the Society for Freshwater Science. She is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the Ecological Society of America.
Go to Profile#8468
Alan S. Rabson
#102388
Overall Influence
1926 - 2018 (92 years)
Alan S. Rabson was an American pathologist and cancer researcher, and was deputy director of the National Cancer Institute from 1995 to 2015. Early life and education Born Alan Saul Rabinowitz in Brooklyn, New York on July 1, 1926, Rabson grew up in Jamaica, Queens, New York. He attended the University of Rochester as an undergraduate, and received his MD from the State University of New York.
Go to Profile#8469
Raymond Gesteland
#74266
Overall Influence
Raymond Gesteland is an American geneticist, currently Distinguished Professor Emeritus at University of Utah. He received his Ph.D. at Harvard University in Biochemistry and his B.S. and M.S. at the University of Wisconsin, also in Biochemistry.
Go to Profile#8470
Jorma Ilonen
#129741
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (74 years)
#8471
Chuanmin M. Hu
#129744
Overall Influence
#8472
Graham Gooday
#120276
Overall Influence
1942 - 2002 (60 years)
Graham William Gooday was a British molecular biologist. He was Professor of Microbiology at Aberdeen University. He was presented with the inaugural Fleming Prize Lecture for the Microbiological Society in 1976. He served as Director of the Institute of Marine Biology.
Go to Profile#8473
Sanford Soverhill Atwood
#58716
Overall Influence
1912 - 2002 (90 years)
Sanford Soverhill Atwood was an American scientist with a specialty in cell biology & plant breeding and academic administrator. Born in Janesville, Wisconsin, Atwood earned his bachelors, masters and Phd from the University of Wisconsin–Madison. He worked as a Professor of Plant Breeding at Cornell University, and then served as Cornell's Provost. He left Cornell to become president of Emory University, where he served from 1963 to 1977. Under his administration, Emory's faculty size doubled, the student body grew by over 60%, invited Emory's first African American commencement speaker and first woman commencement speaker and famously stood by Professor Thomas J.
Go to Profile#8474
David Mouillot
#129772
Overall Influence
#8475
Vivian Pellizari
#110542
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Vivian Helena Pellizari is a Brazilian Antarctic scientist known for her work on establishing Antarctic microbiology in Brazil. Pellizari is the head of Department of Oceanographic Biology at Oceanographic Institute of University of São Paulo.
Go to Profile#8476
Saul Tzipori
#129804
Overall Influence
Saul Tzipori is an American microbiologist, currently the Agnes Varis University Chair and Distinguished Professor at Tufts University. He is a Fellow of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons.
Go to Profile#8477
Bogusław Pawłowski
#100038
Overall Influence
1962 - Present (64 years)
Bogusław Pawłowski is a Polish biologist and professor of biological sciences at the University of Wrocław. President of European Human Behaviour and Evolution Association . He was born in Prudnik. In 1996, he received his PhD in biology from the University of Wroclaw. He completed his habilitation on 22 December 2003. Pawłowski deals with the mechanisms of human evolution and the biological background of human behavior and preferences.
Go to Profile#8478
Giorgio Parmiani
#129822
Overall Influence
#8479
Richard Ν. Fine,
#129823
Overall Influence
#8480
Andrew Ewald
#93177
Overall Influence
Andrew Ewald is a professor of cell biology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He is known for his contributions in the field of metastatic breast cancer research. Education Ewald earned a BS in physics from Haverford College in 1997. He then went on to complete a PhD in 2003 from the California Institute of Technology in biochemistry and molecular biophysics. He researched in Scott Fraser's Lab where he studied light microscopy which would later influence his research.
Go to Profile#8481
William A. Harris
#129838
Overall Influence
#8482
Bridget Stutchbury
#23031
Overall Influence
1962 - Present (64 years)
Bridget J. Stutchbury is a Canadian biologist, currently a Distinguished Research Professor and Canada Research Chair in Ecology and Conservation Biology at York University. She is the author of the book Silence of the Songbirds, finalist for the 2007 Governor General's Award for Non-fiction.
Go to Profile#8483
Barry i. Posner
#129849
Overall Influence
#8484
Markus Aebi
#129872
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (71 years)
#8485
Mehdi Tavassoli
#129875
Overall Influence
#8486
Nicholas Hastie
#117431
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (79 years)
Professor Nicholas Dixon Hastie CBE, FRS, FRSE is a British geneticist, and former Director of the MRC Human Genetics Unit at the University of Edinburgh. Education Hastie was educated at the University of Liverpool and the University of Cambridge.
Go to Profile#8487
Wayne W. Carmichael
#129881
Overall Influence
#8488
Eran Pichersky
#129904
Overall Influence
#8489
Andrew I. Matus
#129912
Overall Influence
#8490
Lynn G. Clark
#92231
Overall Influence
1956 - Present (70 years)
Lynn G. Clark is an American professor of botany at Iowa State University who is an expert in tropical woody bamboos. As a high school student, Clark worked summers with grass expert Thomas Soderstrom at the National Museum of Natural History. She obtained her Ph.D. in botany working with Richard Pohl at Iowa State.
Go to Profile#8491
Irma Gigli
#104000
Overall Influence
1931 - Present (95 years)
Irma Gigli is an emeritus professor at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, and the Walter & Mary Mischer Distinguished Professor in Molecular Medicine, Hans J. Müller-Eberhard Chair in Immunology, and Director Emeritus of the IMM Center for Immunology & Autoimmune Diseases.
Go to Profile#8492
Kim Henrick
#129932
Overall Influence
#8493
José Gilberto Montoya
#42337
Overall Influence
Dr. José Gilberto Montoya is a prominent researcher known for his contributions to the field of infectious diseases, particularly in the area of chronic fatigue syndrome and the role of infectious agents in its development. His research has shed light on the potential involvement of pathogens and immune dysregulation in the pathophysiology of CFS. He was a Professor of Medicine in Infectious Disease at the Stanford University School of Medicine, where he led Stanford's Initiative on Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. He has worked on a wide variety of projects, including research focused on the efficacy of new smallpox vaccines.
Go to Profile#8494
Rachel Wong
#114117
Overall Influence
Rachel Wong is an American neuroscientist who is a professor of Biological Structure at the University of Washington. She studies the developmental mechanisms that determine synaptic connectivity in the central nervous system. She was elected to the National Vision Research Institute of Australia in 2018 and the National Academy of Sciences in 2021.
Go to Profile#8495
Leslie A. Lyons
#82297
Overall Influence
Leslie A. Lyons is an associate professor at University of Missouri College of Veterinary Medicine. Career In 2002, Lyons made international headlines by analyzing the DNA of the world's first cloned cat, a kitten named Cc:, and confirming that it was indeed a true clone, a genetic copy of its mother.
Go to Profile#8496
Hans Georg Prof. Sahl
#129955
Overall Influence
#8497
M. Francesca Cotrufo
#119871
Overall Influence
M. Francesca Cotrufo is a soil ecologist who focuses her work on litter decomposition and the dynamics of soil organic matter. She is currently a Professor and Associate Head in the Department of Soil and Crop Sciences, as well the Senior Scientist at the Natural Resource Ecology Lab, at Colorado State University.
Go to Profile#8498
Andrew M. McIntosh
#112203
Overall Influence
Andrew M. McIntosh is a UK academic psychiatrist. He is Professor of Biological Psychiatry at the Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences, University of Edinburgh, and is an affiliate member of the Centre for Genomic and Experimental Medicine at the University of Edinburgh. The main focus of his research is using genomic and neuroimaging approaches to better understand the causes and causal consequences of Major Depressive Disorder.
Go to Profile#8499
John S. Lazo
#126700
Overall Influence
John Stephen Lazo is an American pharmacologist noted for his work discovering the fundamental mechanisms of action of small molecule therapeutics and the factors that confer drug resistance. He is a professor emeritus of pharmacology at University of Virginia.
Go to Profile#8500
Alan Neil Andersen
#129995
Overall Influence
1957 - Present (69 years)
