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,
#13451
Kenneth j. Clemetson
#165971
Overall Influence
#13452
Lennart Martens
#165973
Overall Influence
1978 - Present (48 years)
#13453
Richard Charles Summerbell
#166002
Overall Influence
#13454
Bernhard Dietzschold
#166010
Overall Influence
#13455
Nils Age Brünner
#166014
Overall Influence
#13456
Dorothy P. Schafer
#128669
Overall Influence
Dorothy P. "Dori" Schafer is an assistant professor in the department of neurobiology at University of Massachusetts Medical School. Her research focuses on the role of microglia in the development of synapses and brain circuits as well as the maintenance of synaptic plasticity.
Go to Profile#13457
Eric S. Menges
#166020
Overall Influence
#13458
Christoph Hedinger
#166030
Overall Influence
#13459
Boris B. Gorzalka
#166031
Overall Influence
#13460
Svend Olav Andersen
#166036
Overall Influence
#13461
Edgar Wingender
#166050
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (74 years)
#13462
Sammy Boussiba
#146338
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (79 years)
Sammy Boussiba is a professor emeritus at the French Associates Institute for Agriculture and Biotechnology of Drylands at the Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel.
Go to Profile#13463
James Michael May
#166061
Overall Influence
#13464
William S. M. Wold
#166063
Overall Influence
#13465
Paul Robert Solomon
#166066
Overall Influence
#13466
Lee Chao
#166079
Overall Influence
#13467
Martin George Sanda
#166083
Overall Influence
#13468
Miren Basaras
#152290
Overall Influence
1968 - Present (58 years)
Miren Basaras Ibarzabal is a microbiologist and professor of the Universidad del País Vasco in the department of immunology, microbiology, and parasitology of the Faculty of Medicine and Nursing in Vizcaya.
Go to Profile#13469
Peter M. Kern
#166092
Overall Influence
#13470
Alan Roberts
#166103
Overall Influence
#13471
Gillian Einstein
#128242
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Gillian Einstein is a faculty member at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health and the Department of Psychology at the University of Toronto, and holder of the inaugural Wilfred and Joyce Posluns Chair in Women's Brain Health and Aging.
Go to Profile#13472
Essa S. Yacoub
#166126
Overall Influence
#13473
Charlotte Poschenrieder
#166132
Overall Influence
#13474
Sally P. Horn
#131285
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (68 years)
Sally P. Horn is a professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Her work in Costa Rica and other tropical regions has been featured in a number of publications, including National Geographic. She has published over 100 articles relating to paleolimnology and biogeography. She is director of the University of Tennessee Laboratory of Paleoenvironmental Research and associate director of the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Science. Horn was named one of the first University of Tennessee Chancellors Professors in 2009.
Go to Profile#13475
Robert M. R. Barclay
#166136
Overall Influence
#13476
Dewey K. Ziegler
#166144
Overall Influence
#13477
R. Charles Anderson
#166159
Overall Influence
#13478
Nir Peled
#166165
Overall Influence
#13479
Suzanne Dickson
#148467
Overall Influence
1966 - Present (60 years)
Suzanne L Dickson is a neurobiologist and Professor of Neuroendocrinology in the Department of Physiology within the Institute of Neuroscience and Physiology at the Sahlgrenska Academy at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden. She graduated from the University of Edinburgh with a B.Sc. in Pharmacology. Her doctorate research was undertaken at the Babraham Institute with Professor Gareth Leng and she graduated with a Ph.D. in Neuroendocrinology from the University of Cambridge in 1993. She is also an Honorary Professor in the College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine at the University of E...
Go to Profile#13480
Roswitha Wiltschko
#166194
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (79 years)
#13481
Gábor László Kovács
#166214
Overall Influence
#13482
Seiki Kuramitsu
#166223
Overall Influence
#13483
Richard M. Glass
#166257
Overall Influence
#13484
Thumbi Ndung'u
#111011
Overall Influence
1969 - Present (57 years)
Thumbi Ndung’u is a Kenyan-born HIV/AIDS researcher. He is the deputy director and a Max Planck Research Group Leader at the Africa Health Research Institute in Durban, South Africa. He is Professor of Infectious Diseases in the Division of Immunity and Infection, University College London. He is Professor and Victor Daitz Chair in HIV/TB Research and Scientific Director of the HIV Pathogenesis Programme at the Nelson R. Mandela School of Medicine, University of KwaZulu-Natal. He holds the South African Research Chair in Systems Biology of HIV/AIDS. He is an Adjunct Professor of Immunology and Infectious Diseases at the Harvard T.H.
Go to Profile#13485
Thomas J. Henneberry
#166260
Overall Influence
#13486
Sacha Gnjatic
#166267
Overall Influence
#13487
Kiyohiro Imai
#166268
Overall Influence
#13488
David B. Rye
#166274
Overall Influence
#13489
Martin Grube
#166286
Overall Influence
1965 - Present (61 years)
#13490
Matthew F. Mescher
#166287
Overall Influence
#13491
Danesh Moazed
#148901
Overall Influence
Danesh Moazed is a Professor of the Department of Cell Biology at Harvard Medical School and an investigator at Howard Hughes Medical Institute. He is known for unveiling the mechanism of the RNAi-mediated heterochromatin establishment. His lab currently works on chromatin biology and epigenetic inheritance.
Go to Profile#13492
Lin Tsung-yi
#41860
Overall Influence
1920 - 2010 (90 years)
Lin Tsung-yi was a Taiwanese academic and educator in psychiatry. Early life and education Lin was born in 1920 in Tainan Prefecture, Japanese Taiwan to Lin Mosei and Chai-Hwang Wang. Like his parents, he studied in Japan, graduating from the School of Medicine at Tokyo Imperial University in 1943. He did postgraduate training at Harvard Medical School and the Institute of Psychiatry at Maudsley Hospital.
Go to Profile#13493
Zhong‐yin Zhang
#166311
Overall Influence
#13494
Ulrich K. Göbel
#166331
Overall Influence
#13495
Vincenzo Silani
#166335
Overall Influence
#13496
Jean-marie Régis
#166339
Overall Influence
#13497
Ralph A. Giannella
#166344
Overall Influence
#13498
Kristine French
#95575
Overall Influence
Kristine French is an Australian plant biologist who is a professor at the University of Wollongong, where she has directed the Janet Cosh Herbarium since 1992. She is known for researching the ecology of weeds, studying urban ecology and "endangered species and forest ecology."
Go to Profile#13499
Kwame McKenzie
#44356
Overall Influence
1963 - Present (63 years)
Kwame Julius McKenzie is a British-Canadian psychiatrist employed as the CEO of Wellesley Institute, a policy think tank based in Toronto, Ontario. Born in the United Kingdom, McKenzie is a physician and full professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto. He has worked as physician, researcher, policy advisor, journalist and broadcaster.
Go to Profile#13500
Pamela J. Fink
#160978
Overall Influence
Pamela J. Fink is a professor emerita in the Department of Immunology at the University of Washington School of Medicine. Fink was the first woman to be editor-in-chief of the Journal of Immunology, serving from 2013–2018.
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