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).

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List of the most influential people in Chemistry,

#2401

Scott R. White

#83433
Overall Influence
1963 - 2018 (55 years)
Scott Ray White was an American engineer. Born in Kansas City, Missouri on February 14, 1963, and raised in Harrisonville, Missouri, White obtained a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from Missouri Institute of Science and Technology. He continued his studies at Washington University in St. Louis and Pennsylvania State University, where he earned a master's in mechanical engineering and doctorate in engineering mechanics, respectively. White began teaching at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 1990, and was eventually named Donald B. Willett Professor in Aerospace Engineering.
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#2402

Gary Hodes

#116898
Overall Influence
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#2403

William Theilheimer

#55453
Overall Influence
1914 - 2005 (91 years)
William Theilheimer , who was born in Augsburg, Germany, played a significant role in the history of what is now known as chemoinformatics. Life He received his Ph.D in organic chemistry from Basel University, Switzerland in 1940. Being Jewish, Basel provided a safe haven for him during the Second World War and he stayed there until 1947 as Assistant to Professor Hans Friedrich Albrecht Erlenmeyer , the son of Friedrich Gustav Carl Emil Erlenmeyer and grandson of Richard August Carl Emil Erlenmeyer . During his time there he compiled the data for the first two volumes of "Synthetische Methoden der Organische Chemie" published by S.
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#2404

Masad Damha

#104142
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (65 years)
Masad J. Damha is a Canadian academic and nucleic acid researcher. He is Distinguished James McGill Professor of Chemistry at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Education and career After growing up in Managua, Nicaragua, Damha moved to Montreal, Quebec, Canada in 1978 for his post-secondary education and received his BSc’83 and PhD’88 degrees from McGill, the latter under the supervision of Prof. Kelvin Ogilvie. He then accepted a position as assistant professor at the University of Toronto's Erindale College from 1987–1992, at which point he returned to McGill University wher...
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#2405

Bernard Fried

#116922
Overall Influence
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#2406

Joel D. Blum

#106123
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (65 years)
Joel D. Blum is a scientist who specializes in isotope geochemistry and environmental geochemistry. He is currently a professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Michigan and an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences. Blum has several named professorships including the John D. MacArthur, Arthur F. Thurnau and Gerald J. Keeler Distinguished Professorship. Blum is a past Co-Editor- in-Chief of Chemical Geology and Elementa, and is the current Editor-in-Chief of the American Chemical Society journal Earth and Space Chemistry.
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#2407

Wolfgang Schnick

Wolfgang Schnick
#116985
Overall Influence
1957 - Present (68 years)
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#2408

Adriano Zecchina

#116997
Overall Influence
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#2409

Norman P. Neureiter

#50979
Overall Influence
1932 - Present (93 years)
Norman P. Neureiter is an American scientist, technology adviser, and expert on science diplomacy. A graduate of the University of Rochester and Northwestern University, Neureiter has worked as a research scientist, a science attaché, a business executive and a governmental advisor. He has been awarded multiple state decorations and has received notable awards from the American Chemical Society, the National Academy of Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
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#2410

S. George Bankoff

#88866
Overall Influence
1921 - 2011 (90 years)
Seymour George Bankoff was an American chemical engineer. Bankoff was born on October 7, 1921, and raised in Brooklyn. He received bachelor's and master's degrees in mineral dressing at Columbia University. Bankoff then worked for the Manhattan Project between stints at DuPont. In 1948, he began teaching at Rose Polytechnic Institute and concurrently earned a Ph.D from Purdue University. Bankoff joined the Northwestern University faculty in 1959, where he was appointed the Walter P. Murphy Professor of Chemical and Mechanical Engineering. In 1966, Bankoff was named a Guggenheim fellow. Over t...
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#2411

Kimberly W. Anderson

#33178
Overall Influence
Kimberly W. Anderson is an American chemist. She is the Gill Eminent Professor of Chemical Engineering and Associate Dean for Administration and Academic Affairs in the College of Engineering at the University of Kentucky.
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#2412

Paolo Samorì

#105054
Overall Influence
1971 - Present (54 years)
Paolo Samorì is an Italian physical chemist and Distinguished Professor and director of the Institut de Science et d'Ingénierie Supramoléculaires of the Université de Strasbourg & CNRS where he is also head of the Nanochemistry Laboratory.
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#2413

Gerd Prof. Dr. Dr. Geißlinger

#117135
Overall Influence
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#2414

Yaakov Nahmias

#40531
Overall Influence
1974 - Present (51 years)
Yaakov "Koby" Nahmias is an Israeli biomedical engineer and entrepreneur. Nahmias is a professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and an affiliated member of the NIH-funded BioMEMS Resource Center at Massachusetts General Hospital.
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#2415

George Walter Kabalka

#117148
Overall Influence
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#2416

Michael Aziz

#56340
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (75 years)
Michael John Aziz is an American research scientist and engineer and the Gene and Tracy Sykes Professor of Materials and Energy Technologies at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. He is an affiliated faculty member of the Harvard University Center for the Environment, for which he served from 2009 to 2018 as the faculty coordinator for the Graduate Consortium for Energy and Environment. He is also Chief Scientist and a co-founder of Quino Energy, Inc.
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#2417

Martin A. Billeter

#117162
Overall Influence
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#2418

Angela Casini

#98404
Overall Influence
1973 - Present (52 years)
Angela Casini is a medicinal and inorganic chemist who works on metal-based compounds as therapeutic agents. She was awarded the 2012 European Medal for Bio-Inorganic Chemistry and made the 2019 American Chemical Society Inorganic Lecturer.
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#2419

Krishnan Rajeshwar

#117210
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (76 years)
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#2420

Tsun‐kong Sham

#117214
Overall Influence
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#2421

Andrew G. Ewing

#114653
Overall Influence
1957 - Present (68 years)
Andrew Graham Ewing is an American chemist. Education Ewing obtained a degree in chemistry from St. Lawrence University in 1979, and a doctorate in the subject at Indiana University in 1983. He joined the Pennsylvania State University faculty in 1984, and held the J. Lloyd Huck Chair in Natural Sciences from 1999 until 2010. He held the named professorship until 2010, when he moved to Sweden to continue his teaching career at Göteborg.
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#2422

John Frank Carpenter

#117252
Overall Influence
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#2423

Franklin A. Davis

#117258
Overall Influence
1939 - Present (86 years)
Franklin Arnold Davis is the Laura H. Carnell Professor of Chemistry at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He is most notable for his development of sulfur-nitrogen reagents including N-sulfonyloxaziridine for oxidations and asymmetric hydroxylations and N-sulfinyl imines for the asymmetric synthesis of chiral amine derivatives. The reagents are commonly called Davis oxaziridines and Davis sulfinamides, respectively. Davis oxidation and Davis' reagent are both named after him.
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#2424

Christy Haynes

#60726
Overall Influence
1977 - Present (48 years)
Christy Lynn Haynes is a chemist at the University of Minnesota. She works at the interface of analytical, biological, and nanomaterials chemistry. Early life and education Haynes was born in Scottsdale, Arizona, in 1977. She completed her undergraduate work at Macalester College, in 1998 with a major in chemistry and minors in mathematics and Spanish. She completed her postbaccalaureate work at Northwestern University completing a master's degree in 1999 and a Ph.D. in 2003 under the direction of Richard P. Van Duyne. Her dissertation, "Fundamentals and Applications of Nanoparticle Optics an...
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#2425

Gordon. Tollin

#117350
Overall Influence
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#2426

Manos Mavrikakis

#114149
Overall Influence
Manos Mavrikakis is a Greek–American chemical engineer. He is the Paul A. Elfers Professor and the Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Mavrikakis is an elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Physical Society, and American Vacuum Society.
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#2427

Françoise Winnik

#109014
Overall Influence
1952 - 2021 (69 years)
Françoise Winnik was a French-born Canadian chemical researcher and professor. She was awarded the in 2015. Winnink was born and raised in France, where she earned her undergraduate degree in chemical engineering at the National School of Chemistry in Mulhouse, France in 1973. She finished her master's degree and PhD in Toronto, Canada in 1974 and 1979 respectively. She later became associate professor at the University of Montreal. the chemistry and physics departments at McMaster University in Canada. In 2018 she moved to Finland and worked at the University of Helsinki. She was elected Fo...
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#2428

James M. Berger

#72270
Overall Influence
1968 - Present (57 years)
James Michael Berger is an American academic working as a professor of biophysics and biophysical chemistry at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, where he is also the co-director of the Cancer Chemical and Structural Biology Program at the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center and the director of the Johns Hopkins Institute for Basic Biomedical Sciences. His main area of research is the functions of molecular cellular machinery.
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#2429

Athula Attygalle

#73149
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (75 years)
Athula Buddhagosha Attygalle is a Sri Lankan scientist who works as a professor in the field of mass spectrometry in the United States. He was awarded the "Inventor of the Year" award in 2014 by the New Jersey Inventors Hall of Fame for his work in mass spectrometric analysis utilizing helium plasma and charge-exchange ionization techniques. In 2017 Attygalle won an Edison Patent Award from the Research and Development Council of New Jersey for his patented work in mass spectrometric analysis utilizing helium-plasma and charge-exchange ionization techniques, and the Arnold Berliner Award in 2...
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#2430

Maria Flytzani-Stephanopoulos

#80019
Overall Influence
1950 - 2019 (69 years)
Maria Flytzani-Stephanopoulos was a Greek chemical engineer and, at the time of her death, had been the Robert and Marcy Haber Endowed Professor in Energy Sustainability and a distinguished professor at Tufts University. Flytzani-Stephanopoulos had also been the Raytheon Professor of Pollution Prevention at Tufts. She published more than 160 scientific articles with over 14,000 citations as of April 2018. She was a Fellow of AIChE, the American Association for the Advancement of Science and American Institute of Chemical Engineers. She lived in the Greater Boston Area with her husband, Profe...
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#2431

George E Fox

#117464
Overall Influence
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#2432

Stanley Roy Morrison

#117541
Overall Influence
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#2433

Ronald D. Macfarlane

#70453
Overall Influence
1933 - Present (92 years)
Ronald D. Macfarlane is distinguished professor of Chemistry at Texas A&M University. In 1991, he received the Inaugural Award of the American Society for Mass Spectrometry's Distinguished Achievement Award.
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#2434

Mario Leclerc

#117583
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (64 years)
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#2435

Mario Nardelli

#117592
Overall Influence
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#2436

Peter D. Mitchell

#117620
Overall Influence
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#2437

Paolo Corradini

#117622
Overall Influence
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#2438

Gerald Pattenden

#117630
Overall Influence
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#2439

František Tureček

#117647
Overall Influence
František Tureček is a Czech-American chemist and professor of chemistry at the University of Washington. His research focuses on the chemistry of highly reactive molecules and mass spectrometric instrumentation and gas-phase ion chemistry.
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#2440

Donald Stephen Matteson

#117766
Overall Influence
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#2441

John Michael Ramsey

#91703
Overall Influence
John Michael Ramsey is an American analytical chemist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He currently holds the position of Minnie N. Goldby Distinguished Professor of Chemistry. His current research with the university focuses on microscale and nanoscale devices such as microchip electrospray, microscale Ion trap mass spectrometers, and microfluidic point of care devices. He is ranked #2 in the "Giants of Nano" field on The Analytical Scientist Power List.
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#2442

Herbert Palme

#117833
Overall Influence
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#2443

Jay Oliver Lampen

#117856
Overall Influence
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#2444

Sabyasachi Sarkar

#46942
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (78 years)
Sabyasachi Sarkar is an Indian chemist. He has worked with functional models related to hyperthermophilic to mesophilic metalloproteins enriching bioinorganic chemistry. A Replica of a Fishy Enzyme and the reduced xanthine oxidase also have been made. Inhibition patterns in the Michaelis complex of low molecular weight hepatic sulfite oxidase model complex have been exhibited. Based on functional mimicking of a series of molybdoenzymes he showed that the even in model enzymatic oxotransfer reactions the participation of similar enzyme-susbrate complex is a real entity. Such a chemical spices...
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#2445

Ian William Murison Smith

#85071
Overall Influence
1937 - 2016 (79 years)
Ian William Murison Smith was a chemist who served as a research fellow and lecturer in the Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge from 1963 to 1985 and Professor of Chemistry at the University of Birmingham from 1985 to 2002.
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#2446

Bernard Jeanrenaud

#117954
Overall Influence
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#2447

Nigel Scrutton

Nigel Scrutton
#86392
Overall Influence
1964 - Present (61 years)
Nigel Shaun Scrutton is a British biochemist and biotechnology innovator known for his work on enzyme catalysis, biophysics and synthetic biology. He is Director of the UK Future Biomanufacturing Research Hub, Director of the Fine and Speciality Chemicals Synthetic Biology Research Centre , and Co-founder, Director and Chief Scientific Officer of the 'fuels-from-biology' company C3 Biotechnologies Ltd. He is Professor of Enzymology and Biophysical Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Manchester. He is former Director of the Manchester Institute of Biotechnology .
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#2448

Sergey Vyazovkin

#117998
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (65 years)
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#2449

Dirk Trauner

#118007
Overall Influence
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#2450

Jeffrey Reimer

#63574
Overall Influence
Jeffrey Allen Reimer is an American chemist, academic, author and researcher. He is the C. Judson King Endowed Professor, a Warren and Katharine Schlinger Distinguished Professor and the chair of the chemical and biomolecular engineering department at University of California, Berkeley.
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