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 …
See additional learning tools, study tips, features on campus life and much more at our Student Resources Headquarters.
List of the most influential people in Biology,
#9151
Wolfram Zillig
#134851
Overall Influence
#9152
Jean De Vellis
#134870
Overall Influence
#9153
Ella Campbell
#122612
Overall Influence
1910 - 2003 (93 years)
Dame Ella Orr Campbell was a New Zealand botanist. An expert on bryophytes, she published 130 scientific papers on liverworts, hornworts, orchids, and wetlands. She became the first woman faculty member of the Massey Agricultural College in 1945, and in 2003 the herbarium at Massey was renamed the Dame Ella Campbell Herbarium in her honour. Following her retirement from teaching in 1976, she continued to research and publish for another two decades, finally retiring in 2000 at the age of 90.
Go to Profile#9154
Cigall Kadoch
#115217
Overall Influence
Cigall Kadoch is an American biochemist and cancer biologist who is Associate Professor of Pediatric Oncology at the Dana–Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School and an Investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Her research is focused in chromatin regulation and how changes in cellular structure can lead to human diseases, such as Cancer, Neurodevelopmental disorders, and others. She is internationally recognized for her work on the mammalian SWI/SNF complex, a large molecular machine known as a Chromatin remodeling complex. She was named as one of the world's leading sc...
Go to Profile#9155
D. H. C. Williams
#134891
Overall Influence
#9156
C. Harles B. Carpenter
#134895
Overall Influence
#9157
Lee M. Harrison
#134900
Overall Influence
#9158
Fabrice Bartolomei
#113842
Overall Influence
Fabrice Bartolomei is a French neurophysiologist, and University Professor at Aix-Marseille University , leading the Service de Neurophysiologie Clinique of the Timone Hospital at the Assistance Publique - Hôpitaux de Marseille, and he is the medical director of the ‘Centre Saint-Paul - Hopital Henri Gastaut’. He is the coordinator of the clinical network CINAPSE that is dedicated to the management of adult and pediatric cases of severe epilepsies and leader of the Federation Hospitalo-Universitaire Epinext. He is also member of the research unit Institut de Neurosciences des Systèmes], UMR110...
Go to Profile#9159
Rosie Woodroffe
#122068
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
Rosemary Brigitte Woodroffe is a British ecologist and academic. Education Woodroffe was educated at the Somerville College, Oxford and was awarded Bachelor of Arts degree in 1989 followed by a Doctor of Philosophy in 1992 for research on factors affecting reproductive success in the European badger, Meles meles L. supervised by David Macdonald.
Go to Profile#9160
Roderick Ian. Mackie
#134922
Overall Influence
#9161
Volkert Seifert
#134923
Overall Influence
#9162
Dennis A. Torchia
#134924
Overall Influence
#9163
Pamela Russell
#115002
Overall Influence
Pamela J. Russell was an Australian academic researcher of immunology, bladder and prostate research. Russell was awarded Membership of the Order of Australia for her research on prostate and bladder cancer in 2003.
Go to Profile#9164
Yoshio Imai
#134929
Overall Influence
#9165
Jerome A. Schiff
#134930
Overall Influence
#9166
Abraham Zangen
#88514
Overall Influence
1969 - Present (57 years)
Abraham Zangen is an Israeli professor of neuroscience, head of the brain stimulation and behavior lab and chair of the psychobiology brain program at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev . Biography Abraham Zangen was born in Ramat Gan, Israel. He earned his B.Sc. in pharmacology from the Hebrew University and his PhD from the Bar Ilan University in Israel in 1999. He then did a postdoc at the U.S. National Institutes of Health until 2003. In 2003, he returned to Israel and established a laboratory at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, attaining the rank of associate professor in 2010.
Go to Profile#9167
Geoffrey D. Thorburn
#134931
Overall Influence
#9168
Eric A. Schon
#134932
Overall Influence
#9169
Itzhak Ofek
#134938
Overall Influence
#9170
David. V. Schaffer
#134941
Overall Influence
#9171
Gillian Murphy
#134946
Overall Influence
#9172
Andreas Bergmann
#134961
Overall Influence
#9173
Arthur Dipl Ing Prochazka
#134962
Overall Influence
#9174
Robert M. Macleod
#134975
Overall Influence
#9175
Yishi Jin
#121692
Overall Influence
1962 - Present (64 years)
Yishi Jin is a Chinese-American neurobiologist who is a professor at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. She is interested in neural development and regeneration in nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. Jin is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Academy of Arts and Sciences and American Society for Cell Biology.
Go to Profile#9176
Joachim Spiess
#134994
Overall Influence
#9177
Michelle Dawson
#27682
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (65 years)
Michelle Dawson is a Canadian autism researcher who was diagnosed with autism in 1993–1994. Since 2004, she has worked as an autism researcher affiliated with the Autism Specialized Clinic of Hôpital Rivière-des-Prairies in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
Go to Profile#9178
Douglas L. Coleman
#135006
Overall Influence
#9179
Fredric L. Coe
#135018
Overall Influence
#9180
Richard Carthew
#128489
Overall Influence
1956 - Present (70 years)
Richard William Carthew is a developmental biologist and quantitative biologist at Northwestern University. He is a professor of molecular biosciences and is the director of the NSF-Simons Center for Quantitative Biology.
Go to Profile#9181
Sidney Zisook
#135028
Overall Influence
#9182
Tatsuo Ishikawa
#135033
Overall Influence
#9183
Volker Höllt
#135034
Overall Influence
#9184
H. Bradley Shaffer
#135035
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (73 years)
#9185
Andrew King
#108475
Overall Influence
1959 - Present (67 years)
Andrew John King is a Professor of Neurophysiology and Wellcome Trust Principal Research Fellow in the Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Merton College, Oxford.
Go to Profile#9186
Naoki Sato
#135038
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
#9187
Leanne Redman
#82381
Overall Influence
Leanne M. Redman is a physiologist. She is an LPFA Endowed Fellowship Professor at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center of the Louisiana State University System, where she studies childhood obesity. She was lead researcher on a study that found that low-calorie diets decreased the effects of aging. Redman received the 2018 NPA Garnett-Powers & Associates Mentor Award in recognition of support for post-doctorate mentee scholars in her reproductive endocrinology lab.In October 2023, Redman was honored by The Obesity Society with the 2023 TOPS Research Achievement Award, in recognition to he...
Go to Profile#9188
Michiaki Kubo
#135047
Overall Influence
#9189
Roger M. Spanswick
#107458
Overall Influence
1939 - 2014 (75 years)
Roger Morgan Spanswick was a Professor of Biological and Environmental Engineering at Cornell University and an important figure in the history of plant membrane biology. Personal life Roger Morgan Spanswick was born on June 24, 1939, in Barford St. John and St. Michael, Oxfordshire, England. He was the son of Lucy and Arthur Spanswick. Roger married Helen Walker in 1963. Andrew Spanswick and Robert Spanswick are their sons. Roger died at his hillside home overlooking Cayuga Lake on February 12, 2014. His gravestone in Pleasant Grove Cemetery in Ithaca, New York, has the phrase only connect f...
Go to Profile#9190
Vijendra K. Singh
#101697
Overall Influence
Vijendra Kumar Singh is a neuroimmunologist who formerly held a post at Utah State University, prior to which he was a professor at the University of Michigan. While affiliated with both institutions, he conducted some controversial autism-related research focusing on the potential role of immune system disorders in the etiology of autism. For example, he has testified before a US congressional committee that, in his view, "three quarters of autistic children suffer from an autoimmune disease."
Go to Profile#9191
Philip Neil Ainslie
#135054
Overall Influence
#9192
Edward Seto
#135055
Overall Influence
#9193
Falk Nimmerjahn
#135058
Overall Influence
#9194
Jane S. Paulsen
#135059
Overall Influence
#9195
Giamila Fantuzzi
#135068
Overall Influence
1964 - Present (62 years)
#9196
Tara Matise
#82069
Overall Influence
Tara Matise is an American geneticist at Rutgers University. Since 2018, she has served as chair of the Department of Genetics. Her research interests span computational genetics, data science, and human genetics. She is co-director of the Rutgers University Genetics Coordinating Center.
Go to Profile#9197
M. H. C. Williams
#135086
Overall Influence
#9198
Mady Hornig
#87052
Overall Influence
1957 - Present (69 years)
Mady Hornig is an American psychiatrist and an associate professor of epidemiology at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health. A physician-scientist, her research involves clinical, epidemiological, and animal model research on autism and related neurodevelopmental conditions. She directs the clinical core of an international investigation of the role of Borna disease virus in human mental illness and participates as a key investigator for the Autism Birth Cohort project, a large prospective epidemiological study, based in Norway, that is identifying how genes and timing interact with environmental agents preceding the onset of autism spectrum diagnoses.
Go to Profile#9199
Pierangelo Geppetti
#135114
Overall Influence
#9200
Harvey Moldofsky
#135117
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
