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 Chemistry,
#2651
Alexandre Alexakis
#122147
Overall Influence
#2652
Ivan Addae Mensah
#53365
Overall Influence
Ivan Addae-Mensah, is a Ghanaian chemist and university administrator who served as the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ghana, Legon from 1996 to 2002. He is an Emeritus Professor of Chemistry at the same institution. He is a Life Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, Fellow of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences and a Fellow of the Ghana Chemical Society.
Go to Profile#2653
J. J. Oró
#122191
Overall Influence
#2654
Debbie C. Crans
#105497
Overall Influence
1955 - Present (70 years)
Debbie C. Crans is a Professor of Organic, Inorganic and Biological Chemistry and of Cell and Molecular Biology at Colorado State University, where she also is a Professor Laureate of the College of Natural Sciences. Crans specializes in the fundamental chemistry and biochemistry of drugs, with particular focus on vanadium and other transition metal ions as metals in medicine and investigation of their mechanisms of toxicity.
Go to Profile#2655
Giancarlo Cravotto
#122242
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (64 years)
#2656
Ulrich Müller
#104009
Overall Influence
1940 - Present (85 years)
Ulrich Müller is a German chemist that is known for his works on solid-state chemistry and the application of crystallographic group theory to crystal chemistry. He is the author of several textbooks on chemistry, solid-state chemistry, and crystallography.
Go to Profile#2657
Abu Bakarr Kanu
#41395
Overall Influence
Abu Bakarr Kanu is a Sierra Leonean analytical chemist who is a professor at Winston-Salem State University. His research considers separation-type instrumentation for the rapid analysis of chemical and biological compounds. Kanu is also involved with education and outreach programmes, and works to bring hands-on chemistry lessons to young people in Sierra Leone.
Go to Profile#2658
Steve Chapman
#34825
Overall Influence
1959 - Present (66 years)
Steven Kenneth Chapman is Vice-Chancellor of Edith Cowan University, Perth, Australia. Previously he was Principal and Vice-Chancellor of Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh. Early life Steve Chapman was born on 12 May 1959 in South Shields, County Durham. Chapman studied at Newcastle University, where he received a First Class BSc degree in Chemistry and completed a PhD in Chemistry . Steve Chapman carried out his postdoctoral studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on a NATO Research Fellowship from 1983 to 1985.
Go to Profile#2659
Horst Henning Winter
#93916
Overall Influence
1941 - Present (84 years)
Horst Henning Winter is a German American chemical engineer, educator and researcher. He is a distinguished professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and was the executive editor of Rheologica Acta from 1989 to 2016, where he has served as honorary editor since 2017.
Go to Profile#2660
Christopher Hardacre
#122393
Overall Influence
#2661
Kazuhiro Maruyama
#122399
Overall Influence
#2662
Robert A. Jenness
#122465
Overall Influence
#2663
Richmond Sarpong
#107520
Overall Influence
1974 - Present (51 years)
Richmond Sarpong is a Ghanaian-American chemist who is a professor at the University of California, Berkeley. Sarpong works on natural product total synthesis to better understand biological systems and allow for the development of novel therapeutics. He was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2017, and was elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2020. He serves on the editorial boards of Organic Syntheses, Accounts of Chemical Research and Synlett.
Go to Profile#2664
George A. M. Cross
#82613
Overall Influence
1942 - Present (83 years)
George Alan Martin Cross FRS is a British molecular parasitologist. He has been André and Bella Meyer Professor of Molecular Parasitology at Rockefeller University since 1982. He was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1984. He was educated at Cheadle Hulme School and Downing College, Cambridge. He was awarded the Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize in 1984.
Go to Profile#2665
Jennie Patrick
#97850
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (76 years)
Jennie Patrick is an American chemical engineer and educator. As a high school student, she participated in the integration of Alabama's public schools. At Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1979, she became one of the first African American women in the United States to earn a doctorate in traditional chemical engineering. She went on to pioneer work on supercritical fluid extraction. Her educational work has focused on the mentoring of African American and female students.
Go to Profile#2666
Olivier Michielin
#122598
Overall Influence
#2667
Brian Coolidge O'regan
#122627
Overall Influence
#2668
Dale William Margerum
#122641
Overall Influence
#2669
Susan M. Kauzlarich
#113880
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (67 years)
Susan M. Kauzlarich is an American chemist and is presently a distinguished professor of chemistry at the University of California, Davis . At UC Davis, Kauzlarich leads a research group focused on the synthesis and characterization of Zintl phases and nanoclusters with applications in the fields of thermoelectric materials, magnetic resonance imaging, energy storage, opto-electronics, and drug delivery. Kauzlarich has published over 250 peer-reviewed publications and has been awarded several patents. In 2009, Kauzlarich received the annual Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathem...
Go to Profile#2670
Paul Jeremy Dean
#122676
Overall Influence
#2671
Hans Vliegenthart
#101755
Overall Influence
1936 - Present (89 years)
Johannes Frederik Gerardus Vliegenthart is a Dutch emeritus professor in bioorganic chemistry of Utrecht University, well known for his research on the synthesis and characterisation of carbohydrates, and biomolecules containing sugar moieties such as glycoproteins and their role in living cells.
Go to Profile#2672
Gyula Julius Vancso
#122796
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (71 years)
#2673
Norman S. Allen
#122800
Overall Influence
#2674
Ricardo A. Broglia
#122825
Overall Influence
#2675
Ian C. Mcneill
#122864
Overall Influence
#2676
Noel L. Owen
#100729
Overall Influence
Noel L. Owen is a professor of chemistry at Brigham Young University who served from 1995 to 2001 as associate chair of the Chemistry and Biochemistry Department. He is also a member of BYU's Cancer Research Center.
Go to Profile#2677
Clyde A. Hutchison Jr.
#82778
Overall Influence
1913 - 2005 (92 years)
Dr. Clyde Allen Hutchison Jr. was an American chemist notable for his research in magnetic resonance spectroscopy. Hutchison was a member of the National Academy of Sciences and a chairman and professor of the department of chemistry at the University of Chicago. He was also a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a fellow of the American Physical Society, a member of the American Chemical Society, Guggenheim fellow at Oxford University, the George Eastman Professor at Oxford University, and a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He was also a recipient of the Peter Debye Award in Physical Chemistry from the American Chemical Society.
Go to Profile#2678
Charles E Alpers
#122894
Overall Influence
#2679
Sonia Contera
#32432
Overall Influence
1970 - Present (55 years)
Sonia Antoranz Contera is a Spanish physicist. She serves as Professor of Biological Physics at the University of Oxford, a senior fellow at the Oxford Martin School, and a senior research fellow at Green Templeton College.
Go to Profile#2680
David. L. Allara
#122969
Overall Influence
#2681
Huai‐guo Xue
#123003
Overall Influence
#2682
Heinz Falk
#101721
Overall Influence
1939 - Present (86 years)
Heinz Falk is professor emeritus for organic chemistry at Johannes Kepler University of Linz and editor of "Progress in the Chemistry of Organic Natural Compounds". His research is focused on structural analysis, synthesis, stereochemistry and photochemistry of plant and animal photosensitizing and photosensory pigments, such as hypericin.
Go to Profile#2683
Patrick William Mccarthy Jacobs
#123059
Overall Influence
#2684
C. Frederick Koelsch
#114838
Overall Influence
1907 - 1999 (92 years)
Charles Frederick Koelsch was an American organic chemist who spent his faculty career at the University of Minnesota. Education and academic career Koelsch was born in Boise, Idaho in 1907 in a family of German descent. He attended the University of Wisconsin and earned his bachelor's degree in 1928 and his Ph.D. from the same institution in 1931, working under the supervision of Samuel M. McElvain. After a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University with Elmer Peter Kohler, Koelsch was recommended for a position at the University of Minnesota by Lee Irvin Smith. He joined the faculty there as an instructor in 1932 and became an assistant professor in 1934.
Go to Profile#2685
Louis A. Girifalco
#123106
Overall Influence
#2686
Rina Tannenbaum
#46756
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (72 years)
Rina Tannenbaum is an Israeli/American materials scientist and chemical engineer and presently professor in the program of chemical and molecular engineering in the department of materials science and engineering at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. She received her Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich.
Go to Profile#2687
Dermot Diamond
#123151
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (25 years)
#2688
Joachim H. Prof. Dr. Wendorff
#123153
Overall Influence
#2689
Livia S. Eberlin
#41473
Overall Influence
Livia Schiavinato Eberlin is a Brazilian analytical chemist who won a MacArthur "Genius" Fellowship for her research on the use of mass spectrometry to detect cancerous tissue. Education and career Eberlin is the daughter of Marcos Nogueira Eberlin, a Brazilian chemist at the University of Campinas. She was born in Campinas, and she earned her bachelor's degree in 2007 from the University of Campinas. During her undergraduate studies, she did summer research in mass spectrometry at Purdue University, where her father also had research ties. She later enrolled at Purdue for her doctorate, which she completed in 2012.
Go to Profile#2690
Kurt Drickamer
#123173
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (73 years)
#2691
Hugh Allen Oliver Hill
#123194
Overall Influence
#2692
Hans Georg von Schnering
#121972
Overall Influence
1931 - 2010 (79 years)
Hans Georg von Schnering was a German chemist and professor of inorganic chemistry at the University of Münster, honorary professor at the University of Stuttgart and director at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research.
Go to Profile#2693
Kazuaki Ishihara
#123198
Overall Influence
1963 - Present (62 years)
#2694
W. Harmon Ray
#123212
Overall Influence
#2695
Peter G. Brewer
#123216
Overall Influence
#2696
Malcolm Renfrew
#38944
Overall Influence
1910 - 2013 (103 years)
Malcolm MacKenzie Renfrew was an American polymer chemist, inventor, and professor emeritus at the University of Idaho in Moscow, Idaho. Renfrew Hall, the university's chemistry building, was named for him in 1985.
Go to Profile#2697
Mutsuo Sekiguchi
#123226
Overall Influence
#2698
Gerald Thomas. Babcock
#123316
Overall Influence
#2699
Rahul Banerjee
#71147
Overall Influence
1978 - Present (47 years)
Rahul Banerjee is a Bengali Indian organic chemistt and a professor at the department of chemical sciences of the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Kolkata. Banerjee, a fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, is known for his studies in the field of Metal–organic framework designing. The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, the apex agency of the Government of India for scientific research, awarded him the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science and Technology, one of the highest Indian science awards, for his contributions to chemical sciences in 2018. Current...
Go to Profile#2700
David J. Nesbitt
#123360
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (72 years)
