Search People Result | Academic Influence

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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Search Influential People

Person Name

School

Gender

Country

Discipline

Subdiscipline

Ranking

List of the most influential people in Biology,

#14401

M. Philip Kahl

#63130

Overall Influence

1934 - 2012 (78 years)

Marvin Philip Kahl was an American zoologist who studied birds and elephants. From the 1950s to 1980s, Kahl conducted his avian research on storks, flamingos and spoonbills. During this time period, Kahl worked for various places including the National Audubon Society and Rare Animal Relief Effort. In the 1990s, Kahl switched his research to elephants and continued to study them until the 2010s.

#14402

Per Uhlén

#168673

Overall Influence

1969 - Present (57 years)

Per Uhlén, born in 1969 in Uppsala, is a Swedish researcher in cell and molecular biology and professor of cell signaling at Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. Uhlén conducts research about cell signaling and how different cues affect important biological processes for cancer and development, such as cell division, cell differentiation and cell death. Uhlén is also conducting research using three-dimensional imaging with light sheet fluorescence microscopy and tissue clearing to map, characterize, and diagnose intact tumor samples.

#14403

Jessica Ware

#111344

Overall Influence

1984 - Present (42 years)

Jessica Lee Ware is a Canadian-American evolutionary biologist and entomologist. She is the associate curator of invertebrate zoology at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. In addition, she is a principal investigator at the Sackler Institute for Comparative Genomics and an associate professor for the Richard Gilder Graduate School.

#14404

Jill R. Harper

#136235

Overall Influence

1972 - Present (54 years)

Jill Reiss Harper is an American molecular biologist and policy advisor serving as the deputy director for science management and executive officer at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

#14405

Maria Natasha Rajah

#125611

Overall Influence

Maria Natashini "Natasha" Rajah is a Canadian neuroscientist who is a Full Professor at the Department of Psychology, Toronto Metropolitan University. Prior to joining Toronto Metropolitan University in August 2023, she was Full Professor at the Department of Psychiatry at McGill University from 2005 to July 2023, and was the inaugural Scientific Director of the Cerebral Imaging Center at the Douglas Research Centre from 2011 to 2021. She is a cognitive neuroscientist who is interested in episodic memory, ageing and dementia. Her research uses functional magnetic resonance imaging to investi...

#14406

Naoki Mori

#150454

Overall Influence

Naoki Mori is a Japanese virologist who is a professor at the University of the Ryukyus in Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. He has received numerous awards for his research on human T-cell leukemia virus type 1 , a retrovirus which causes adult T-cell leukemia.

#14407

Anna Cox

#80987

Overall Influence

Anna Louise Cox is a British Professor of Human Computer Interaction in the University College London Faculty of Brain Sciences. Her research considers evidence-based approaches to reduce work-related stress and remain focussed through the use of digital technology. Cox serves as Vice Dean for Equality, Diversity & Inclusion and was an advisor to the House of Commons Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee for their select committee enquiry on immersive and addictive technologies.

#14408

Valentina Grigorievna Sideleva

#106375

Overall Influence

#14409

Cees Gielis

#169046

Overall Influence

Cees Gielis is a Dutch entomologist and researcher of biodiversity, specializing in Lepidoptera, at the Naturalis Biodiversity Center in Leiden, Netherlands. As of March 2019, Gielis authored 378 taxa within the family of Pterophoridae and 19 within the family of Alucitidae.

#14410

Milena Holmgren

#174112

Overall Influence

1966 - Present (60 years)

Milena Holmgren is a Chilean ecologist who is a lecturer at the Wageningen University and a writer of over 60 peer-reviewed articles which were published in such journals as the Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, Oikos, Science, and many others.

#14411

Shane T. Ahyong

#174121

Overall Influence

Shane Timothy Ahyong is an Australian zoologist specialising in marine invertebrates. Since 2010 he has worked as a senior principal research scientist at the Australian Museum. Following his Ph.D. he worked as a post-doctoral researcher at the Australian Museum and in 2006 left to manage Marine Biodiversity and Biosecurity Group and Marine Invasives Taxonomic Service within the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research in New Zealand.

#14412

Melanie Blokesch

#173742

Overall Influence

1976 - Present (50 years)

Melanie Blokesch is a German microbiologist. Her research focuses on Vibrio cholerae, the bacterium causing cholera. She is a professor of life sciences at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne , where she heads the Laboratory of Molecular Microbiology.

#14413

Elise Pendall

#174009

Overall Influence

Elise Gislaine Pendall is an American soil and ecosystem ecologist who is a professor at Western Sydney University. She studies how biogeochemical cycling responds to climate change and disturbances to the ecosystem.

#14414

John Woods

#113818

Overall Influence

1939 - Present (87 years)

Professor John David Woods, CBE is a British oceanographer. He studied physics at Imperial College, London , after which he was appointed principal research fellow at the Meteorological Office , while leading the RN Operation Thermocline in which he pioneered underwater flow visualisation. Later he joined NERC as Director of Marine and Atmospheric Science , where he created the National Oceanography Centre at Southampton. He held professorships at Southampton University , Kiel University and Imperial College London , carrying out research into the seasonal boundary layer of the ocean and pla...

#14415

Eric R. Gamazon

#173350

Overall Influence

Eric R. Gamazon is a statistical geneticist in Vanderbilt University, with faculty affiliations in the Division of Genetic Medicine, Data Science Institute, and Center for Precision Medicine. He is a Life Member of Clare Hall, Cambridge University after election to a Visiting Fellowship .

#14416

Nicholas Jakubovics

#106991

Overall Influence

Nicholas Stephen Jakubovics is a British dental researcher and academic who is a professor of oral microbiology at the School of Dental Sciences, Newcastle University. He is editor-in-chief of the Journal of Dental Research. His research concentrates on microbial adhesion, colonisation and cell-cell interactions, primarily in dental plaque.

#14417

Bruce Hayward

#173571

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (76 years)

Bruce William Hayward is a New Zealand geologist, marine ecologist, and author. He is known as a leading expert on living and fossil foraminifera. Education and career At the University of Auckland, Bruce W. Hayward graduated in geology with B.Sc. in 1971 and Ph.D. in 1975. In 1976–1977 he was a postdoc at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. Hayward was from 1978 to 1991 a micropaleontologist for the New Zealand Geological Survey, Lower Hutt. In March 1991 Hayward became the curator of marine invertebrates at the Auckland Institute and Museum, after the retirement of Walter Olivier Cernohorsky.

#14418

Thomas Woolsey

#149596

Overall Influence

1943 - Present (83 years)

Thomas Allen Woolsey is an American neuroscientist, currently George H. and Ethel R. Bishop Scholar in Neuroscience at Washington University in St. Louis. He was born in Baltimore, studied for his B.S. at the University of Wisconsin and was awarded Doctor of Medicine at Johns Hopkins University in 1969.

#14419

Kunio Doi

#174241

Overall Influence

#14420

Erin M. Gibson

#160969

Overall Influence

Erin M. Gibson is a glial and circadian biologist as well as an assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and the Stanford Center for Sleep Sciences and Medicine at Stanford University. Gibson investigates the role of glial cells in sculpting neural circuits and mechanistically probes how the circadian rhythm modulates glial biology.

#14421

Oded Beja

#114420

Overall Influence

1964 - Present (62 years)

Oded Béjà is a professor in the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, in the field of marine microbiology and metagenomics. Academic work Oded Béjà is best known for discovering the first bacterial rhodopsin naming it proteorhodopsin, during his postdoctoral fellowship in the laboratory of Edward DeLong. Oded Béjà's laboratory focuses currently on the role and diversity of photosynthetic viruses infecting cyanobacteria in the oceans, and the use of functional metagenomics for the discovery of new light sensing proteins.

#14422

Stacy Philpott

#92316

Overall Influence

Stacy Philpott is an American ecologist who is a professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Her research considers agroecology and the conservation of biodiversity. She was elected a Fellow of the Ecological Society of America in 2021.

#14423

Belinda Ferrari

#131202

Overall Influence

2000 - Present (26 years)

Belinda Carlene Ferrari is an Australian microbiologist who specialises in the genetics and ecology of soil bacteria and fungi, particularly in polar regions. She is an associate professor at the University of New South Wales in the School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, where she heads a microbiology laboratory.

#14424

Susan Strome

#174270

Overall Influence

1952 - Present (74 years)

Susan Strome is a Distinguished Professor of Molecular, Cell, and Developmental Biology at the University of California Santa Cruz. Strome received a B.A. degree in chemistry from University of New Mexico and a Ph.D. in biochemistry from the University of Washington, as well as post-graduate work at the University of Colorado Boulder. Strome is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the National Academy of Sciences.

#14425

Mercedes S. Foster

#154172

Overall Influence

1942 - Present (84 years)

Mercedes S. Foster is an American zoologist who researched the evolution of lek behavior in birds, bird-plant interactions, and male-male cooperation in reproduction. She is very active in conservation efforts, including training workshops, being a Scientific Advisor for the National Bio-inventory Program of Paraguay, as a Founding Director of the American Bird Conservancy, and as a Founder and Co-coordinator of the Latin American Library Enhancement Program. She is also the Director and Editor of a program to publish handbooks giving "standard methods for measuring and monitoring the biodive...

#14426

Sarah Woodin

#174288

Overall Influence

Sarah Woodin is an American biologist currently at University of South Carolina and an Elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

#14427

Denise Dearing

#80382

Overall Influence

Maria Denise Dearing is an American ecological physiologist and mammalogist. As a distinguished professor at the University of Utah, Dearing's research has focused on animals and toxic diets and diseases.

#14428

Katsusuke Meguro

#173356

Overall Influence

#14429

Dorothy Riggs Pitelka

#173798

Overall Influence

1920 - 1994 (74 years)

Dorothy Riggs Pitelka was an American zoologist, protistologist, cancer researcher, and pioneer in applications of electron microscopy to zoology and protistology, known for her 1963 book Electron-Microscopic Structure of Protozoa.

#14430

Katherine Ewel

#161030

Overall Influence

1944 - Present (82 years)

Katherine Carter Ewel is a Professor Emeritus at the University of Florida's School of Forest Resources and Conservation. She is an ecosystem, forest, and wetlands ecologist who has worked in Florida for much of her career, focusing much of it on cypress swamps, pine plantations, and mangrove forests in the Pacific. Ewel served as the vice-president of the Society of Wetland Scientists in 2003, becoming president in 2004 and now since 2005, a past president. She has now retired and lives near Gainesville, Florida.

#14431

Vince Smith

#127317

Overall Influence

2000 - Present (26 years)

Vince Smith is a British entomologist and biodiversity informatician at the Natural History Museum, London. Education and career Smith completed a bachelor's degree at the University of Bristol, before completing a PhD at the University of Glasgow specialising on parasitic lice . He went on to research host-parasite evolution at the University of Glasgow and then the Illinois Natural History Survey, where he helped develop the Biocorder laboratory management software. In 2006, he joined the Natural History Museum, London, as a cybertaxonomist, before becoming a Research Leader in Informatics ...

#14432

Sandi Lam

#132738

Overall Influence

2000 - Present (26 years)

Sandi Lam is a Canadian pediatric neurosurgeon and is known for her research in minimally invasive endoscopic hemispherectomy for patients with epilepsy. Lam is the Vice Chair for Pediatric Neurological Surgery at Northwestern University and the Division Chief of Pediatric Neurosurgery at Lurie Children's Hospital. She has spent her career advancing pediatric brain surgery capabilities globally through her work in Kenya performing surgeries as well as training and mentoring local residents and fellows.

#14433

Yolanda van Heezik

#172954

Overall Influence

Yolanda van Heezik is a New Zealand academic and a professor of zoology at the University of Otago. She is considered one of New Zealand's first urban ecologists. In 1988 van Heezik completed a PhD at the University of Otago in animal biology, writing her thesis on penguin ecology. Her research is focused on birds and other wildlife in urban areas, and biodiversity of gardens. She also researches and writes about children's connections with nature.

#14434

Carlos Arteaga

#104595

Overall Influence

Carlos L. Arteaga is the Associate Director for Clinical Research, director of the Center for Cancer Targeted Therapies, and professor of Cancer Biology and Medicine at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center. In 2014–2015, he was the president of the American Association for Cancer Research.

#14435

Raffaella Rumiati

#170045

Overall Influence

1961 - Present (65 years)

Raffaella Ida Rumiati is professor of cognitive neuroscience at the International School for Advanced Studies [Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati], , Italy. She sits on the editorial board of the journal Cognitive Neuropsychology, and is an action editor for the journal Brain and Cognition. Rumiati is also a member of the steering committee of the European Workshop on Cognitive Neuropsychology. and a member of The NeuroGenderings Network.

#14436

Xiaofeng Zhou

#125899

Overall Influence

Dr. Xiaofeng Zhou, Associate Professor, Center for Molecular Biology of Oral Diseases, University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry, is an internationally known oral cancer researcher. His primary research interest is to utilize molecular genetics and bioinformatics technologies to develop novel diagnostic tools and to gain a better understanding of human diseases such as head and neck/oral cancer. His research is focused on the genetic mapping of disease genes and/or consistent genomic alterations that are associated with the development and progression of oral cancer.

#14437

Crislyn D'Souza-Schorey

#174259

Overall Influence

Crislyn D'Souza-Schorey is an American-Indian biologist. She is the Morris Pollard Professor and former Department Chair of Biological Sciences at the University of Notre Dame. D'Souza-Schorey researches how membrane trafficking impacts cell motility under normal conditions and in disease states.

#14438

Anne Searls De Groot

Anne Searls De Groot

#172558

Overall Influence

1956 - Present (70 years)

Anne Searls De Groot is a physician, immunologist and entrepreneur. She is the co-founder and CEO/CSO of the immunoinformatics company EpiVax. She is actively involved in graduate teaching at the Center for Vaccines and Immunology and guides the scientific research program in her laboratory at EpiVax.

#14439

Janet Wilmshurst

#152902

Overall Influence

1966 - Present (60 years)

Janet Mary Wilmshurst is a New Zealand palaeoecologist who works on reconstructing the ecological past. Wilmshurst has been a Fellow of the Royal Society Te Apārangi since 2015. She was president of the New Zealand Ecological Society, and currently works as principal scientist in long-term ecology at Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research focusing on recent fossil records to reconstruct and trace past ecosystem changes in response to natural disturbance.

#14440

Rachel Wynberg

#91358

Overall Influence

Rachel P. Wynberg is a South African biodiversity researcher and natural scientist who is a professor at the department of Environmental and Geography Sciences at the University of Cape Town. Life and work

#14441

Aleksandr N. Kotlyar

#173460

Overall Influence

#14442

Konstantin R. Tabachnick

#173461

Overall Influence

#14443

Masahiro Aizawa

#161446

Overall Influence

#14444

Joshua M. Epstein

#174417

Overall Influence

#14445

Jean-Michel Oughourlian

Jean-Michel Oughourlian

#54644

Overall Influence

1940 - Present (86 years)

Jean-Michel Oughourlian is an Armenian-French neuropsychiatrist and psychologist as well as a writer and philosopher recognized both in France and the United States for his collaboration with René Girard and his work on the mimetic theory of desire. Since the early 1970s he has devoted both his clinical work and his research to applying and developing Girard's theories in the fields of psychiatry, psychology, and psychopathology. He is the author of several books , in which he developed clinical points of view around mimetic theory of desire.

#14446

Renate Radek

#161873

Overall Influence

Renate Radek is a protistologist and an associate professor at the Freie Universität Berlin. Education Radek received a Diploma in biology from the University of Bonn in 1985. She received her PhD in 1987 at the University of Bonn's Institute of Cytology, supervised by .

#14447

Jill Macoska

#144812

Overall Influence

Jill A. Macoska is an American scientist and professor. She is the Alton J. Brann endowed chair and distinguished professor of science and mathematics at the University of Massachusetts Boston. Education Macoska earned a B.A. in physical anthropology from Kent State University . She holds an M.Phil. and Ph.D. in biochemistry from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. She completed postdoctoral work at Harvard University in molecular genetics and at the Michigan Cancer Foundation.

#14448

Vibeke Videm

#168634

Overall Influence

1957 - Present (69 years)

Vibeke Videm is a professor of clinical and molecular medicine at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, Norway, where she specializes in inflammation and immunology. She also is a senior physician at St. Olav's University Hospital.

#14449

Judith Mank

#173848

Overall Influence

1976 - Present (50 years)

Judith Elizabeth Mank is an American-British zoologist who is a Canada 150 Chair at the University of British Columbia. She studies how evolution produces variation in animals. She is interested in sexual dimorphism and the formation of sex chromosomes.

#14450

Claudia M. Palena

#116166

Overall Influence

Claudia M. Palena is an American-Argentine immunologist and cancer researcher. She is head of the immunoregulation section at the National Cancer Institute. Palena researches tumor immunology and cancer immunotherapy.

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