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,
#8601
Barbara Franke
#130691
Overall Influence
#8602
Merja E. Penttilä
#130692
Overall Influence
#8603
Coral Barbas
#75535
Overall Influence
1957 - Present (69 years)
María del Coral Barbas Arribas is a professor at the Universidad CEU San Pablo in Madrid, Spain who is known for her research on metabolomics and integration of chemical data. Education and career Barbas has a Ph.D. from Complutense University of Madrid. From 2005 until 2006 she was a Marie Curie fellow at King's College London. As of 2022 she is a professor of analytical chemistry at the Universidad CEU San Pablo and is the president of the Madrid section of the Spanish Royal Society of Chemistry.
Go to Profile#8604
Allan U. Munck
#130703
Overall Influence
#8605
J. Michael Scott
#49073
Overall Influence
1941 - Present (85 years)
J. Michael Scott is an American scientist, professor, environmentalist and author. Early life and education Scott is the eldest son of Eileen Rose Busby, an author and antiques expert, and Jim Scott, a Senior Olympics winner who helped pioneer and develop the game of racquetball. He is the grandson of California artist Esther Rose, the nephew of the late Russian Orthodox Hieromonk Seraphim Rose, brother of true crime author Cathy Scott and volunteer Cordelia Mendoza.
Go to Profile#8606
Craig E. Cameron
#125888
Overall Influence
1966 - Present (60 years)
Craig E. Cameron is the chair of the department of microbiology and immunology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and American Society for Microbiology.
Go to Profile#8607
Gert Vriend
#130732
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
#8608
Ichiro Chibata
#130749
Overall Influence
#8609
David Walton
#99201
Overall Influence
1945 - 2019 (74 years)
David W. H. Walton was a British emeritus professor with the British Antarctic Survey. Walton trained as an ecologist and was a specialist in the Antarctic. He was the first chair of the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research Standing Committee on the Antarctic Treaty System and held this position from 2002 to 2006. He was the Chief Scientist on the Antarctic Circumpolar Expedition which took place from December 2016 to March 2017 aboard the Russian research vessel Akademik Treshnikov.
Go to Profile#8610
Champ B. Tanner
#130767
Overall Influence
#8611
Terri Goss Kinzy
#50932
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
Terri Goss Kinzy is an American biochemist, educator and academic administrator. Life Kinzy was born in Canton, Ohio. Kinzy was partly inspired by a high school physics teacher to pursue a career in science. She completed a B.S. in chemistry, magna cum laude, at the University of Akron in 1985. She was a chemist at BP America in Warrensville Heights, Ohio from 1985 to 1987, focusing on biofuel development. Kinzy completed a Ph.D. in biochemistry at the Case Western Reserve University. Her 1991 dissertation was titled Characterization of GTP and aminoacyl-tRNA binding to eukaryotic initiation factor 2 and elongation factor 1.
Go to Profile#8612
Ronald Lawrence Hayes
#130800
Overall Influence
#8613
Hiroshi Ohkawa
#130811
Overall Influence
#8614
Hsiang‐fu Kung
#130815
Overall Influence
#8615
N. H. Ashton
#87309
Overall Influence
1913 - 2000 (87 years)
Norman Henry Ashton CBE, FRCP, FRCS, FRCPATH, FRCOphth, FRS was a British ophthalmologist and pathologist. Ashton studied medicine at King's College London, doing his practical work at Westminster Hospital Medical School , and qualified in 1939 with a specialisation in pathology. In 1941 he became a pathologist for Kent and Canterbury Hospital, leaving in 1945 to serve in the Royal Army Medical Corps. After demobilisation in 1947 he was invited to become Director of Pathology at the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology, a position he held for 30 years. During this time he did key research on retino...
Go to Profile#8616
Jacques Ravel
#130835
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
Jacques Ravel is an American microbiologist and professor, currently serving as Director at the Institute for Genome Sciences and Professor of Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. His academic work focuses on the dynamic between microbiome and women's health, and has included research on the role of the vaginal microbiome in protecting against infections, currently explored through LUCA Biologics as part of Seed. Ravel is currently director of the Collaborative Research Center on Sexually Transmitted Diseases, exploring the 'connection between human gen...
Go to Profile#8617
Harry F. Bradford
#130837
Overall Influence
#8618
David Carl Steffens
#130846
Overall Influence
#8619
Róbert Balázs
#130855
Overall Influence
#8620
Milton W. Brightman
#130864
Overall Influence
#8621
Mitsuru Uchiyama
#130870
Overall Influence
#8622
Jonathan Z. Simon
#130877
Overall Influence
1963 - Present (63 years)
#8623
Jarmo R. K. Virtamo
#130881
Overall Influence
#8624
Albert Rothenberg
#83623
Overall Influence
1930 - Present (96 years)
Albert Rothenberg is an American psychiatrist who has carried out long term research on the creative process in literature, art, science and psychotherapy. As Principal Investigator of the research project Studies in the Creative Process, Rothenberg has focused on the creative processes of consensually recognized and defined creators. These have included Nobel laureates in physics, chemistry, medicine and physiology; Pulitzer Prize and other literary prize winners; and consensually designated young literary and artistic creators.
Go to Profile#8625
Herbert Young Reynolds
#130896
Overall Influence
#8626
Volkert Arolt
#130919
Overall Influence
#8627
Malcolm L. Gefter
#130931
Overall Influence
#8628
Inger Sandlie
#130933
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (73 years)
Inger Sandlie is a Norwegian molecular biologist. She took her dr.philos. degree in biochemistry at the University of Bergen, and was a post-doctoral fellow at the Johns Hopkins University. She was hired at the University of Oslo in 1988, and is now a professor at the Section for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. She is a fellow of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters.
Go to Profile#8629
Charan Ranganath
#130943
Overall Influence
#8630
Robert Desharnais
#112059
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (71 years)
Robert Desharnais is an American evolutionary biologist. His research area is population biology and ecology. Education Desharnais studied biology at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, earning a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1976. At the University of Rhode Island, in 1979, he earned a Master of Science degree in zoology, and in 1982 he received a Doctor of Philosophy degree in zoology. His doctoral advisor was the population geneticist Robert F. Constantino.
Go to Profile#8631
Paul McKeigue
#92673
Overall Influence
Paul McKeigue is professor of genetic epidemiology and statistical genetics at the University of Edinburgh, a post he assumed in 2007. He is a signatory to the Great Barrington Declaration. Earlier in his career, he was a professor at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and University College Dublin.
Go to Profile#8632
Byeong Chun Lee
#88641
Overall Influence
1965 - Present (61 years)
Yi Byeong-cheon is the veterinary professor at Seoul National University responsible for the ₩300 million KRW "Toppy" dog cloning program in 2007. Yi is a former aide to Hwang Woo-suk, a pioneer in the field with the "Snuppy" clone, who fell from grace after his stem cell research turned out to have been fabricated. Yi has been described as "one of the world's best-known dog cloning experts."
Go to Profile#8633
Paul W. Kincade
#130972
Overall Influence
#8634
William C. Eckelman
#130982
Overall Influence
#8635
Sandra Pizzarello
#123940
Overall Influence
1933 - 2021 (88 years)
Sandra Pizzarello, D.Bi.Sc. was a Venetian biochemist known for her co-discovery of amino acid enantiomeric excess in carbonaceous chondrite meteorites. Her research interests concerned the characterization of meteoritic organic compounds in elucidating the evolution of planetary homochirality. Pizzarello was a project collaborator and co-investigator for the NASA Astrobiology Institute , the president of the International Society for the Study of the Origin of Life , and an emerita professor at Arizona State University .
Go to Profile#8636
Wang Yanyi
#55233
Overall Influence
1981 - Present (45 years)
Wang Yanyi , is a Chinese immunologist and virologist. Since 2018, she became the director general at the Wuhan Institute of Virology and the deputy director for Wuhan in the China Zhi Gong Party. Education Wang earned her Bachelor's degree at the Peking University in 2004. After graduating, she went to the University of Colorado for her master's degree. She is married to Shu Hongbing, a graduate of Emory University.
Go to Profile#8637
Pierre Mein
#131003
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
#8638
Diane Barber
#122289
Overall Influence
Diane L. Barber is an American cell biologist. She is an Endowed Professor and Chair of the Department of Cell and Tissue Biology at University of California, San Francisco and an elected American Association for the Advancement of Science fellow in recognition of her "distinguished contributions on cell signaling by plasma membrane ion transport proteins and on the design and function of proteins regulated by intracellular pH dynamics." In addition to teaching graduate and professional students and her administrative service, she directs a research laboratory funded by grants from the Natio...
Go to Profile#8639
H. Vasken Aposhian
#103737
Overall Influence
1926 - 2019 (93 years)
Hurair Vasken Aposhian was a Ph.D. toxicologist and an emeritus professor of molecular and cell biology at the University of Arizona, a post he held beginning in 1975. He is also a former professor of pharmacology at the medical school at said university. He received his bachelor's degree in chemistry, at Brown University, 1948. He received a master's degree and a PhD in physiological chemistry at the University of Rochester, where he published some scientific studies about the synthesis of isoalloxazine ring-containing compounds. He did a postdoctoral with Nobel Laureate Arthur Kornberg in the department of biochemistry at Stanford University School of Medicine.
Go to Profile#8640
Samuel G. Wildman
#119237
Overall Influence
1912 - 2004 (92 years)
Samuel Goodnow Wildman was an American biologist. Wildman joined the University of California, Los Angeles, as a professor of biology in 1950 and retired in 1979. Professor Wildman is best known for his leading work over several decades on "Fraction I protein" although his record of publications spanned more than 60 years in total. In 1979, the American Society of Plant Physiologists awarded him with the Charles Barnes Life Membership Award, placing him in company with notables such as Erwin Bünning.
Go to Profile#8641
Frédéric Y. Bois
#65803
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (68 years)
Frédéric Yves Bois is a French biological scientist working in toxicology and bioinformatics. He is currently Senior Scientific Advisor at Simcyp, a Certara-owned company. Biography Frédéric Bois was born in Limoges, France, in 1958. He obtained his Pharm.D. from the and his Ph.D. from the University of Metz . Most of his Ph.D. thesis, on the use of physiologically based pharmacokinetic models and stochastic carcinogenesis models for risk assessment, was developed at the Harvard University Energy and Environmental Policy Center . His post-doctoral research was performed at UCSF and UC Berkeley School of Public Health.
Go to Profile#8642
Masaki Kitajima
#131026
Overall Influence
#8643
Charles S. Cox
#131041
Overall Influence
#8644
Samuel I. Rapaport
#131056
Overall Influence
#8645
Sultan M. M. Karim
#131063
Overall Influence
#8646
Damien Fair
#39707
Overall Influence
Damien Fair is a behavioral neuroscientist, professor at the University of Minnesota, and director of the Masonic Institute for the Developing Brain. In 2020, he was selected for the MacArthur Fellows Program. In 2013, he received the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers.
Go to Profile#8647
Andy Lehrer
#113273
Overall Influence
1930 - 2014 (84 years)
Andy Z. Lehrer was a Romanian entomologist. From 1996 until his death, he worked as a research associate in the laboratory of Zoology at the University of Tel Aviv in Tel Aviv, Israel. For several years, he studied flesh flies and blow flies from all over the world.
Go to Profile#8648
Kathleen E. Cullen
#100523
Overall Influence
Kathleen E. Cullen is an American–Canadian biomedical engineer and neuroscientist. She is known for her work combining computational and systems neuroscience to understand how the brain encodes and processes self-motion information to ensure the maintenance of balance and stable perception. Her research also focuses on extending this knowledge to further advance the development of novel diagnostic tools, treatments, training, and rehabilitative strategies for patients.
Go to Profile#8649
Samuel Bernard Formal
#131069
Overall Influence
#8650
Norman C. Ellstrand
#131087
Overall Influence
