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).

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Person Name

School

Gender

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Discipline

Subdiscipline

Ranking

List of the most influential people in Earth Sciences,

#2601

Barry Keim

#180065

Overall Influence

1963 - Present (63 years)

Barry David Keim is the Richard J. Russell Professor in the Department of Geography & Anthropology at Louisiana State University , as well as the state climatologist for the state of Louisiana. He was previously on the faculty of the University of New Hampshire, and was the New Hampshire state climatologist, from 1994 to 2003. He is known for researching extreme weather, such as hurricanes and heavy rainfall.

#2602

Garniss Curtis

#54943

Overall Influence

1919 - 2012 (93 years)

Garniss H. Curtis, was a professor of geology at the University of California, Berkeley, geochronologist, volcanologist, geophysicist, and founder of the Berkeley Geochronology Center. In 1960, Curtis and fellow UC Berkeley geophysicist Jack Evernden used potassium-argon dating methods developed by UC Berkeley physicist John Reynolds on minerals found in tephra deposits collected by Evernden to date Mary Leakey's 1959 Olduvai Gorge Bed I hominin Zinjanthropus to 1.89 to 1.57 Mya. The great age of the fossil hominid and associated stone tools in the bed pushed back the then accepted age of the Pleistocene another million years, causing a stir in the geology community.

#2603

Paul Torrens

#165156

Overall Influence

Paul Morrison Torrens is a professor in New York University Tandon School of Engineering's Department of Computer Science and Engineering and Center for Urban Science and Progress. He co-authored the book Geosimulation: Automata-Based Modeling of Urban Phenomena.

#2604

Arne Bjørlykke

#108252

Overall Influence

1943 - Present (83 years)

Arne Bjørlykke is a Norwegian geologist. He took an education in mining engineering at the Norwegian Institute of Technology, graduating in 1967. He worked at the Norwegian Geological Survey from 1968 to 1984, and was then a professor at the University of Oslo from 1984 to 1994. He then returned to the Norwegian Geological Survey as managing director from 1994 to 2006 and senior researcher from 2006 to 2009. In 2009 he was hired as the new director of the Natural History Museum at the University of Oslo, succeeding Elen Roaldset. He is a fellow of the Norwegian Academy of Technological Scienc...

#2605

Andrea Cau

#105741

Overall Influence

1978 - Present (48 years)

Andrea Cau is an Italian vertebrate paleontologist. He specializes in the study of dinosaur cladistics. Cau named the unique dromaeosaurid theropod, Halszkaraptor in 2017. He also reanalyzed the theropod Balaur, placing it as a basal avialan rather than a dromaeosaur.

#2606

Roger Powell

#101288

Overall Influence

1949 - Present (77 years)

Roger Powell FRS, is a British-born Australian based educator and academic. He is Emeritus professor in the School of Geography, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the University of Melbourne. Education Powell was educated at Durham University where he was awarded a Bachelor of Science degree in 1970. He went on to study at the University of Oxford where he was awarded a Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1973 for research on mineral equilibria in the schist rock near Fort William, Scotland supervised by Stephen W. Richardson.

#2607

Tony Waldron

#142922

Overall Influence

1948 - 2021 (73 years)

Tony Waldron was a British physician and bioarchaeologist specialising in occupational medicine, palaeopathology, and palaeoepidemiology. He was an honorary professor at the UCL Institute of Archaeology, a lecturer in occupational medicine at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, and a consultant physician at University College Hospital and St Mary's Hospital. He wrote a number of books on bioarchaeology, including the widely used textbooks Palaeoepidemiology and Palaeopathology .

#2608

Cynthia Burek

#151310

Overall Influence

Cynthia Veronica Burek is a Professor of Geoconservation at the University of Chester. She serves on the steering group of the Geodiversity Action Plan and as a Director of the British Federation of Women Graduates.

#2609

Alycia Stigall

#127788

Overall Influence

Alycia L. Stigall is an American palaeontologist. As a professor at Ohio University, she was the first to analyze the biogeographic ranges of Paleozoic fossils using Geographic information systems. Early life and education Stigall was born and raised in Colerain Township, Hamilton County, Ohio to parents Jackie and Joe Stigall. Growing up, she spent time collecting brachiopods and bryozoans from a nearby creek and went camping in various National Parks across the country. Stigall attended Colerain High School where she was a National Merit Finalist and member of the National Honor Society, Marching Band, Collage, Show Choir, and German Club.

#2610

Adrian Bailey

#105155

Overall Influence

1962 - Present (64 years)

Adrian J. Bailey is a scholar known for his research in population, migration, economic, and social geography. He is currently chair professor of geography and Dean of Social Sciences at Hong Kong Baptist University. His research interests include the study of transnationalism, with his work in this area exploring the diverse ways in which the state affects life outcomes among immigrants and refugees.

#2611

Owain Jones

#112842

Overall Influence

1957 - Present (69 years)

Owain Jones FGS is a Professor of Environmental Humanities at Bath Spa University . He was previously Reader in Cultural Geography: Place, Nature and Landscape at the Countryside & Community Research Institute and member of staff of the Department of Geography and Environmental Management, Faculty of Environment and Technology, University of the West of England.

#2612

Joyashree Roy

#131212

Overall Influence

1957 - Present (69 years)

Joyashree Roy is an Indian economist with specialization in the fields of Environmental economics, energy economics and Climate change mitigation. She is a Professor of Economics in the Department of Economics, Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India. She is also the Inaugural Bangabandhu Chair Professor at the Asian Institute of Technology , Thailand. She joined AIT in the year 2018 under the Bangabandhu Chair on 'Sustainable Energy' at the Department of Energy, Environment, and Climate Change, School of Environment, Resources and Climate Change. The Bangabandhu Chair was officially inaugurated o...

#2613

Huang Shisong

#177027

Overall Influence

1919 - 2017 (98 years)

Huang Shisong was a Chinese meteorologist. Huang hails from Jinhua, Zhejiang. There he received his initial education, then he was admitted to the Department of Aeronautical Engineer of then National Central University in 1938. However, the infection of one of his fingers limited his manual dexterity, he switched over to geography. As one of first graduates of Meteorology, he received his degree in 1942. Later, he studied at University of Chicago and UCLA, under Carl-Gustaf Rossby and Jacob Bjerknes's guidance successively. For unknown reason, he dropped out his PhD course, returned to mainl...

#2614

Dorothy Jung Echols

#174508

Overall Influence

1916 - 1997 (81 years)

Dorothy Jung Echols was an American geologist known for her significant contributions to the field of micropaleontology and her instrumental role in the Deep Sea Drilling Project. She also held a distinguished position as a professor for the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis.

#2615

Christine Lane

#179883

Overall Influence

1980 - Present (46 years)

Christine Susanna Lane is a physical geographer and Quaternary researcher. She has held the Professor of Geography chair in the University of Cambridge, Department of Geography since 2016. Education Christine Lane was educated at Cardiff University where she was awarded a Bachelor of Science degree in Geology. She then went on to earn a MSc in Quaternary Science from Royal Holloway, University of London. Following her masters, she moved to Oxford to help establish the Cryptotephra Laboratory at the Research Laboratory for Archaeology and the History of Art , University of Oxford, part of the Royal Holloway and Oxford Tephrochronology Research group .

#2616

Jianping Wu

#183134

Overall Influence

#2617

Roy W. Simonson

#175900

Overall Influence

1908 - 2008 (100 years)

Roy W. Simonson was an American scientist, professor, and writer who studied soil across the United States and on islands in the Western Pacific. He taught at Iowa State College from 1938 to 1943 and then became a Soil Correlator for the Division of Soil Survey at the United States Department of Agriculture. During World War II, Simonson worked for the Military Geology Unit to map soils on islands in the Western Pacific. Simonson spent the rest of his career at the Soil Survey until his retirement in 1973. In his retirement, he occasionally taught courses on soil genesis as a visiting profess...

#2618

Dorothy J. Merritts

#181484

Overall Influence

1958 - Present (68 years)

Dorothy Jane Merritts is an American geologist. She is the Harry W. & Mary B. Huffnagle Professor of Geosciences at Franklin & Marshall College. In 2022, Merritts was elected a Member of the National Academy of Sciences.

#2619

José Lutzenberger

#40977

Overall Influence

1926 - 2002 (76 years)

José Antônio Kroeff Lutzenberger was a Brazilian agronomist and environmentalist. In 1988, he was awarded the Right Livelihood Award for his "contribution to protecting the natural environment in Brazil and worldwide".

#2620

Kevin M. Scott

#123844

Overall Influence

1935 - Present (91 years)

Kevin M. Scott is an American geologist, author, and fellow of the Geological Society of America . Scott is a Scientist Emeritus for the United States Geological Survey . The Kevin Islands of Antarctica are named after him.

#2621

Neville Brown

#179377

Overall Influence

1932 - 2018 (86 years)

Neville Brown . He was a Doctor of Science in Applied Geophysics. Since 1994 he was a senior member of Mansfield College in Oxford. His career was heavily involved in the interaction between the humanities and physics, particularly on sky sciences. He studied economics with geography at University College London and later modern history at New College, Oxford.

#2622

Gao Shan

#99687

Overall Influence

1962 - 2016 (54 years)

Gao Shan was a Chinese geochemist and academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences . He was a professor of geochemistry at the China University of Geosciences . Biography Gao obtained a bachelor's degree of geology from Northwest University in 1982. He was enrolled to China University of Geosciences in 1985 when he obtained a master's degree. He received his PhD from China University of Geosciences in 1989. Following this, he was an Alexander von Humboldt Foundation post-doctoral scientist at the Geochemisches institute, University of Göttingen, before he returned to China to take up a faculty position at China University of Geosciences.

#2623

Patrick Christie

#183247

Overall Influence

#2624

Bernhard Eitel

#55269

Overall Influence

1959 - Present (67 years)

Bernhard Eitel is a German earth scientist and geographer. Eitel was born in Baden. Since October 2007, he has been the Rector of Heidelberg University. See also Sustainable Development

#2625

Vivi Vajda

#143114

Overall Influence

Vivi Vajda is a Swedish palaeontologist. She is Professor and head of palaeobiology at the Swedish Museum of Natural History. Through the study of microscopic fossils such as pollen, plankton, algae, and fungi, Vajda's research focuses on past vegetation changes, plant communities, and mass extinctions. She has also contributed to the understanding of the Cretaceous-Paleogene mass extinction. She is a member of the Royal Physiographic Society in Lund.

#2626

Charles B. Moore

#67217

Overall Influence

1920 - 2010 (90 years)

Charles Bachman Moore Jr. was an American physicist, engineer and meteorologist, known for his research on atmospheric physics and his work with gas balloons. He was born in Maryville, Tennessee. Career Moore attended college at Georgia Institute of Technology in 1940. During World War II, he served as a weather equipment officer for the U.S. Army Air Corps in the China-Burma-India theater, and later in occupied China. Moore returned to Georgia Tech after the war, and received a bachelor's degree in chemical engineering in 1947.

#2627

Cora Randall

#182043

Overall Influence

Cora Einterz Randall is an atmospheric scientist known for her research on particles in the atmosphere, particularly in polar regions. Education and career Randall has a B.A. in Chemistry from State University of New York at Purchase . She earned an M.S. and a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of California Santa Cruz . She then conducted research at University of California Santa Cruz and Carnegie Mellon University before joining University of Colorado Boulder in 1989 as a Research Scientist; in 2010 she became a professor in the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences.

#2628

Dorian Abbot

#66117

Overall Influence

Dorian Schuyler Abbot is an American geophysicist. He is an associate professor at the University of Chicago. Education Abbot completed a A.B. in physics and a S.M. and Ph.D. in applied mathematics at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. His dissertation was titled A high-latitude convective cloud feedback. Abbot's doctoral advisor was . From 2008 to 2009, he was a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University. Abbot conducted post doctoral research in geophysical sciences from 2009 to 2011 at the Universit...

#2629

Ioannis Katsoyiannis

Ioannis Katsoyiannis

#170162

Overall Influence

1974 - Present (52 years)

Ioannis Katsoyiannis is a Greek environmental chemist, currently associate professor at the department of chemistry at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. He has earned a reputation among aquatic chemists because of his studies on the development of novel technologies for arsenic removal from groundwaters, especially the investigation and development of biological arsenic removal. He was born in Thessaloniki, in Greece and comes from his father's side from the village of Spileon in Grevena and from his mother's side from Chalastra, a suburb of Thessaloniki mostly known for biggest rice production in Greece and the mussel cultivation and production.

#2630

Ahmed Ibrahim Awale

#88255

Overall Influence

1954 - Present (72 years)

Ahmed Ibrahim Awale is a Somali environmentalist, botanist and author. He is an environmentalist with more than two decades of experience. He is the chairman of the Somaliland Biodiversity Foundation, as well as Candlelight for Environment, Education, and Health. He also lectures on environmental science at the University of Hargeysa and is the author of several books including, Environment in Crisis: selected essays on the Somali environment.

#2631

Nina-Marie Lister

#137359

Overall Influence

Nina-Marie Lister is Professor and Graduate Director of the School of Urban and Regional Planning at Toronto Metropolitan University , where she also leads the Ecological Design Lab. In 2021, she was appointed a Senior Fellow of Massey College. From 2010 to 2014, she was a Visiting Associate Professor of landscape architecture and urban planning at Harvard Graduate School of Design. Her career has spanned private and public-sector work, integrating ecological science with planning and design. As both a researcher and a practitioner, she is founding principal of PLANDFORM, a creative design practice.

#2632

Kären Wigen

#168028

Overall Influence

1958 - Present (68 years)

Kären Esther Wigen is an American historian, geographer, author and educator. She is a history professor at Stanford University. Early life and education Wigen was born in East Lansing, Michigan, United States. She graduated from University of Michigan in 1980, where she studied Japanese literature. She earned her doctorate at the University of California at Berkeley in geography in 1990.

#2633

Helen Bostock

#155334

Overall Influence

1977 - Present (49 years)

Helen Clare Bostock, is an oceanographer researching past, present and future conditions in the Southern Ocean. In 2011 she led a research voyage on board the RV Tangaroa to the Solander Trough region of the Tasman Sea. Two years later she was deputy voyage leader for an expedition to the Mertz Polynya, Antarctica. In 2016 she was awarded the McKay Hammer, for her combined research achievements between 2013 and 2016.

#2634

Jacek Rutkowski

#177697

Overall Influence

1934 - 2016 (82 years)

Jacek Rutkowski – Polish geologist, scientist, professor at AGH University of Science and Technology in Cracow . Life and education Jacek Rutkowski was born in 1934 in Zamość. In 1951 he graduated from Bartłomiej Nowodworski high school in Kraków and began geology studies at the AGH University of Science and Technology. He obtained his master's diploma in 1956 and in the same year he was accepted as an assistant at the Department of Non-metallic Ore Deposits headed by prof. Marian Kamieński. In 1959 he became a senior assistant. A year later, after completing supplementary studies, he obtained a master's engineer’s degree in geology of solid mineral deposits.

#2635

Suzanne Gray

#63254

Overall Influence

Suzanne Gray is a British expert in dynamical meteorology and professor of meteorology at the University of Reading, where she is currently academic head of the Department of Meteorology. She has made significant contributions to the understanding and prediction of extreme windstorms and tropical cyclones.

#2636

Hazel Rymer

#173153

Overall Influence

Hazel Rymer is a British volcanologist and Pro-Vice Chancellor at the Open University. Her research investigates how active volcanoes affect their environment and impact global climate change. She leads the citizen science project Earth Watch.

#2637

John Sherrod

#177006

Overall Influence

1924 - 2004 (80 years)

John Sherrod was an American meteorologist and information scientist. Biography John Sherrod was born on September 10, 1924, in Kane, Pennsylvania. Sherrod received a B.S. in mathematics from Allegheny College, Meadville, Pa., in 1947 and then a B.S. and M.S. in meteorology from Pennsylvania State College, where he remained as instructor and research meteorologist until 1952.

#2638

Hannah Ritchie

#117670

Overall Influence

1993 - Present (33 years)

Hannah Ritchie is a Scottish data scientist, senior researcher at the University of Oxford in the Oxford Martin School and head of research at Our World in Data. Her research investigates the assessment of global food systems and visualising data from the COVID-19 pandemic. Her first book, The First Generation, is due to be published by Chatto & Windus.

#2639

Ceridwen Fraser

#171837

Overall Influence

1979 - Present (47 years)

Ceridwen Fraser is an Australian biogeographer, currently serving as a research associate professor for the Department of Marine Science at the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand. She focuses her studies on ecology, evolution, climate change, and how they are all significant to the southern hemisphere, specifically at higher latitudes such as Antarctica.

#2640

Irmgard Abs-Wurmbach

#180022

Overall Influence

1938 - 2020 (82 years)

Irmgard Abs-Wurmbach was a German mineralogist and the mineral Abswurmbachite is named after her. She was professor at the Technical University of Berlin. Life She was professor for applied mineralogy at the TU Berlin since 1991. Previously, she taught and researched at the University of Bonn, Ruhr-University Bochum, University of Bern and Philipps-University Marburg. She did research in the field of absorption, electron spin resonance and Mößbauer spectroscopy.

#2641

Mostafa Momeni

#171019

Overall Influence

1940 - 2017 (77 years)

Mostafa Momeni was an Iranian geographer and professor at Shahid Beheshti University. Education and career Momeni was a doctoral student at the University of Marburg . He was selected for the 18th edition of the Book of the Year in Iran for writing the book Database of Geography in Iran: Database of Urban Geography in Iran. In addition to numerous research projects, more than 30 scientific articles in various fields of geography have been published and published in prestigious domestic and foreign journals. Mostafa Momeni's research has been done in the fields of urban geography, worldview, c...

#2642

Kirstin Dow

#183792

Overall Influence

1963 - Present (63 years)

Kirstin Dow is a Carolina Trustees Professor of Geography at the University of South Carolina and the Lead Investigator of the Carolinas Integrated Sciences and Assessments . She is also a co-author of The Atlas of Climate Change which has been published in ten languages and a science advisor on climate change alleviation and adaptation for local and national efforts such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

#2643

Vivian de Buffrénil

#86765

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (76 years)

Vivian de Buffrénil is a French histologist and paleobiologist who has worked at the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris from 1982 to 2021. His doctorate and his doctorat d'état , a diploma now replaced by the habilitation, were supervised by Armand de Ricqlès. His main fields of interest include basic histological descriptions, growth dynamics as recorded in bone growth marks, and adaptation of the tetrapod skeleton to a secondarily aquatic lifestyle. He is also interested in life history and population dynamics of exploited or threatened reptile taxa, especially among Varanidae and Crocodilia.

#2644

Stephan Matthai

#121119

Overall Influence

2000 - Present (26 years)

Stephan Konrad Matthai is a German geologist and petroleum engineer. He is currently Professor of Reservoir Engineering at University of Melbourne. Previously he had the same position at the University of Leoben.

#2645

Catherine E. Badgley

Catherine E. Badgley

#111720

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (76 years)

Catherine E. Badgley is an American paleontologist and professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. The focus of Badgley's research is the evolution and fossil history and biodiversity of mammals, especially the role of mountains in driving biodiversity patterns. She has also pursued research on organic agriculture and global food supplies, for which she has received considerable public attention. Badgley has also authored a children's book, Pippa's First Summer, with artist Bonnie Miljour.

#2646

Fyaz Hussain Khan

#177240

Overall Influence

1924 - 1991 (67 years)

Fyaz Hussain Khan was a Bangladesh geologist. Early life Khan was born on 10 February 1924 in Kolkata, West Bengal, British India. He was educated in The Calcutta Madrasa. He completed his B.A. and M.A. in geology from the Presidency College, Kolkata.

#2647

Annette Summers Engel

#176226

Overall Influence

Annette Summers Engel is an American earth scientist who is Donald and Florence Jones Professor of Aqueous Geochemistry at the University of Tennessee. Her research considers how microbes interact with rocks and minerals. She was elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2019.

#2648

Steve Larter

#135987

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (73 years)

Stephen R. Larter is a Canadian Emeritus Professor of geochemistry at the University of Calgary. Dr. Larter was appointed as associate vice-president , effective Feb. 25, 2019 at the University of Calgary.

#2649

John McMahon Crossan

#184028

Overall Influence

1974 - Present (52 years)

#2650

Varavudh Suteethorn

#89210

Overall Influence

1948 - Present (78 years)

Varavudh Suteethorn, or Warawut Suteethorn is a Thai palaeontologist and geologist. He is the current director of the Palaeontological Research and Education Centre, Mahasarakham University. He is best known for his work on vertebrate paleontology in northeastern Thailand, having contributed to the discovery of many fossil taxa and dig sites in the Khorat Plateau, as a part of a long-standing collaboration between Thai and French scientists.

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