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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School

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Subdiscipline

Ranking

List of the most influential people in Engineering,

#501

Matteo Thun

#14891

Overall Influence

1952 - Present (72 years)

Matteo Thun is an Italian architect and designer. Biography Matteo Thun was born in Bolzano in 1952 as the first son of the South Tyrolean entrepreneurial family Thun , his younger brother Peter took over the management of Thun AG in 1978.

#502

Nader Engheta

#17193

Overall Influence

1955 - Present (69 years)

Nader Engheta is an Iranian-American scientist. He has made pioneering contributions to the fields of metamaterials, transformation optics, plasmonic optics, nanophotonics, graphene photonics, nano-materials, nanoscale optics, nano-antennas and miniaturized antennas, physics and reverse-engineering of polarization vision in nature, bio-inspired optical imaging, fractional paradigm in electrodynamics, and electromagnetics and microwaves.

#503

Mohamed-Slim Alouini

#25930

Overall Influence

Mohamed-Slim Alouini is a Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology , Thuwal, Makkah Province, Saudi Arabia. His research interests include the modeling, design, and performance analysis of wireless, satellite, and optical communication systems. He is a fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and OPTICA

#504

Chung Laung Liu

#12315

Overall Influence

1934 - 2020 (86 years)

Chung Laung Liu , also known as David Liu or C. L. Liu, was a Taiwanese computer scientist. Born in Guangzhou, he spent his childhood in Macau. He received his B.Sc. degree in Taiwan, master's degree and doctorate in United States.

#505

Wiel Arets

#16161

Overall Influence

1955 - Present (69 years)

Wiel Arets is a Dutch architect, architectural theorist, urbanist, industrial designer and the former dean of the college of architecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, in the United States of America. Arets was previously the 'Professor of Building Planning and Design' at the Berlin University of the Arts , Germany, and studied at the Technical University of Eindhoven, graduating in 1983. The same year later he founded Wiel Arets Architects, a multidisciplinary architecture and design studio, today with studios in Amsterdam, Maastricht, Munich, and Zürich. From 1995-2002...

#506

Iraj Etesam

#11701

Overall Influence

1930 - Present (94 years)

Iraj Etesam was an Iranian contemporary architect, educator, and author. He was the designer and architect of the Mellat Park of Tehran and the Cyrus Park, as well as a professor of architecture in Iran.

#507

Frances Bronet

#23081

Overall Influence

Frances Bronet is a Canadian architect and academic administrator, currently serving as president of the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York. Education Bronet holds three undergraduate degrees from McGill University, including a Bachelor of Science in Architecture and professional Bachelor of Architecture from the McGill School of Architecture as well as a degree in civil engineering. She also completed a management diploma program. Bronet later earned an Master of Science in Architectural Design from Columbia University. She is a member of Ordre des architectes du Québec.

#508

Hamid Jafarkhani

#11781

Overall Influence

1966 - Present (58 years)

Hamid Jafarkhani is an Iranian-born American electrical engineer and professor. He serves as the Chancellor's Professor in electrical engineering and computer science in the Henry Samueli School of Engineering at the University of California, Irvine . His research focuses on communications theory, particularly coding and wireless communications and networks.

#509

Richard Weller

#13292

Overall Influence

Richard Weller is an Australian landscape architect and academic. He is Professor and Chair of Landscape Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, having succeeded James Corner in 2013. Weller also holds the Martin and Margy Meyerson Chair of Urbanism at the University of Pennsylvania, is on the board of directors of the Landscape Architecture Foundation, Washington D.C., and is Creative Director of the award-winning LA+ Interdisciplinary Journal of Landscape Architecture. He was formerly a Winthrop Professor of Landscape Architecture at the University of Western Australia, and director of the Australian Urban Design Research Centre .

#510

Lee Friedlander

#6356

Overall Influence

1934 - Present (90 years)

Lee Friedlander is an American photographer and artist. In the 1960s and 1970s, Friedlander evolved an influential and often imitated visual language of urban "social landscape," with many of his photographs including fragments of store-front reflections, structures framed by fences, posters and street signs. His work is characterized by its innovative use of framing and reflection, often using the natural environment or architectural elements to frame his subjects. Over the course of his career, Friedlander has been the recipient of numerous awards and his work has been exhibited in major mu...

#511

Susumu Tachi

#24355

Overall Influence

1946 - Present (78 years)

is a professor of Graduate School of Media Design at Keio University and Professor Emeritus of the University of Tokyo. Education Dr. Tachi received the B.E., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees in mathematical engineering and information physics from the University of Tokyo in 1968, 1970, and 1973, respectively.

#512

Pravin Varaiya

#29044

Overall Influence

1940 - 2022 (82 years)

Pravin Pratap Varaiya was Nortel Networks Distinguished Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. Varaiya received his B.Sc. from University of Bombay and his Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering in 1963 from University of California, Berkeley.

#513

Asad Abidi

#8572

Overall Influence

1956 - Present (68 years)

Asad Ali Abidi is a Pakistani-American electrical engineer. He serves as a tenured professor at University of California, Los Angeles, and is the inaugural holder of the Abdus Salam Chair at the Lahore University of Management Sciences . He is best known for pioneering RF CMOS technology during the late 1980s to early 1990s. As of 2008, the radio transceivers in all wireless networking devices and modern mobile phones are mass-produced as RF CMOS devices.

#514

Kang G. Shin

#23947

Overall Influence

1946 - Present (78 years)

Kang Geun Shin is a South Korean-born computer scientist and the Kevin and Nancy O'Connor Professor of Computer Science in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department at the University of Michigan. He is also the founding director of the Real-Time Computing Laboratory . He is known for his contributions to the field of real-time fault-tolerant systems. Shin is a recipient of the Korean Ho-Am Prize in Engineering. This prize is awarded for the "outstanding contributions to the development of science and culture and enhancement of the welfare of mankind".

#515

Tshilidzi Marwala

Tshilidzi Marwala

#2619

Overall Influence

1971 - Present (53 years)

Tshilidzi Marwala is a South African artificial intelligence engineer, a computer scientist, a mechanical engineer and a university administrator. He is currently Rector of the United Nations University and UN Under-Secretary-General. In August 2023 Marwala was appointed to the United Nations scientific advisory council.

#516

Lynn S. Beedle

#28938

Overall Influence

1917 - 2003 (86 years)

Dr. Lynn S. Beedle was an American structural engineer, the founder and the director of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, and known for his design and building of skyscrapers. The New York Times has called him "an expert on tall buildings".

#517

Taylor Wang

#10276

Overall Influence

1940 - Present (84 years)

Taylor Gun-Jin Wang is a Chinese-born American scientist and in 1985, became the first person of Chinese origin to go into space. While an employee of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Wang was a payload specialist on the Space Shuttle Challenger mission STS-51-B.

#518

Alexander Tzonis

Alexander Tzonis

#21085

Overall Influence

1937 - Present (87 years)

Alexander Tzonis is a Greek-born architect, author, and researcher. He has made contributions to architectural theory, history and design cognition, bringing together scientific and humanistic approaches in a synthesis. Since 1975, he has been collaborating in most projects with Liane Lefaivre. In 1985, he founded and directed Design Knowledge Systems , a multidisciplinary research institute for the study of architectural theory and the development of design thinking tools at TU Delft. Tzonis is known for his work on the classical canon, history of the emergence and development of modern arc...

#519

David Adjaye

#6296

Overall Influence

1966 - Present (58 years)

Sir David Frank Adjaye is a Ghanaian-British architect. He is known for having designed many notable buildings around the world, including the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C. Adjaye was knighted in the 2017 New Year Honours for services to architecture. He is the recipient of the 2021 Royal Gold Medal, making him the first African recipient and one of the youngest recipients. He was appointed to the Order of Merit in 2022.

#520

Joel H. Ferziger

#30497

Overall Influence

1937 - 2004 (67 years)

Joel Henry Ferziger was a Professor Emeritus of mechanical engineering at the Stanford University, Palo Alto, California, United States. Ferziger was an internationally recognized authority in fluid mechanics. His main area of research was computational fluid dynamics. He was known for developing computer simulations to model complex turbulent flows.

#521

Hans W. Liepmann

#17071

Overall Influence

1914 - 2009 (95 years)

Hans Wolfgang Liepmann was an American fluid dynamicist, aerospace scientist and emeritus Theodore von Kármán Professor of Aeronautics at the California Institute of Technology. He is known for his numerous contributions in fluid mechanics covering a wide range of problem areas, such as flow instability and turbulence, gas kinetics, viscous compressible fluids and liquid helium flows.

#522

Der Scutt

#20244

Overall Influence

1934 - 2010 (76 years)

Der Scutt was an American architect and designer of a number of major and notable buildings throughout New York City and the United States. Scutt worked on Trump Tower next to the Tiffany & Co. flagship store on Fifth Avenue, New York City, developed by Donald Trump. His other major buildings include One Astor Plaza, 520 Madison Avenue, the Continental Insurance Corporation headquarters in New York City, and the Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company Headquarters in Milwaukee. He was the design consultant for the Grand Hyatt New York.

#523

Ramesh Raskar

#8739

Overall Influence

1970 - Present (54 years)

Ramesh Raskar is a Massachusetts Institute of Technology associate professor and head of the MIT Media Lab's Camera Culture research group. Previously he worked as a senior research scientist at Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories during 2002 to 2008. He holds 132 patents in computer vision, computational health, sensors and imaging. He received the $500K Lemelson–MIT Prize in 2016. The prize money will be used for launching REDX.io, a group platform for co-innovation in Artificial Intelligence. He is well known for inventing EyeNetra , EyeCatra and EyeSelfie , Femto-photography and h...

#524

James Wines

#23996

Overall Influence

1932 - Present (92 years)

James Wines is an American artist and architect associated with environmental design. Wines is founder and president of SITE, a New York City -based architecture and environmental arts organization chartered in 1970. This multi-disciplinary practice focuses on the design of buildings, public spaces, environmental art works, landscape designs, master plans, interiors and product design. The main focus of his design work is on green issues and the integration of buildings with their surrounding contexts.

#525

Reimund Neugebauer

Reimund Neugebauer

#15056

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (71 years)

Reimund Neugebauer is a German mechanical engineer and professor who has been working in the field of machine tools and forming processes. On 1 October 2012 he took office as the tenth President of the Fraunhofer Society, the largest research organization in Europe, from his predecessor Hans-Jörg Bullinger.

#526

Supriyo Datta

#16833

Overall Influence

1954 - Present (70 years)

Supriyo Datta is an Indian–American researcher and author. A leading figure in the modeling and understanding of nano-scale electronic conduction, he has been called "one of the most original thinkers in the field of nanoscale electronics."

#527

Ulrich Lemmer

#12130

Overall Influence

2000 - Present (24 years)

Ulrich Lemmer is a German electrical engineer and professor specializing in optoelectronics. Education Ulrich Lemmer received a diploma degree in physics from RWTH Aachen University in 1990 and a Ph.D. from the University of Marburg in 1995. From 1995 to 1996, he held a postdoctoral position with the University of California at Santa Barbara.

#528

Kurt Akeley

#13840

Overall Influence

1958 - Present (66 years)

Kurt Akeley is an American computer graphics engineer. Akeley was elected into the National Academy of Engineering in 2005 for contributions to the architecture of 3-D graphics systems and the definition of Open GL, now the industry standard.

#529

Cyril M. Harris

#17808

Overall Influence

1917 - 2011 (94 years)

Cyril Manton Harris was Professor Emeritus of Architecture and Charles Batchelor Professor Emeritus of Electrical Engineering at Columbia University. He received his B.S. in mathematics and his M.S. in physics from UCLA, and his Ph.D. in physics from Massachusetts Institute of Technology , where he specialized in acoustics.

#530

Shigeo Hirose

#26218

Overall Influence

1947 - Present (77 years)

Shigeo Hirose is a pioneer of robotics technology and a professor at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. Born in Tokyo and attending Hibiya High School, he graduated from Yokohama National University in 1971 and received a Ph.D. from Tokyo Institute of Technology in 1976 where he later took professorship.

#531

Mehrdad Abedi

#23534

Overall Influence

1948 - Present (76 years)

Mehrdad Abedi is an electrical engineer and electric machinery researcher and professor of power engineering at Amirkabir University of Technology. Life and career Abedi was born in 1948 in Tehran, Iran. He graduated from the University of Tehran with a degree in electrical engineering In 1970, he received an MS degree from Imperial College London in 1973 and a Ph.D from Newcastle University, both in electrical engineering with a speciality in electric machinery and power engineering.

#532

Hani Rashid

#21489

Overall Influence

1958 - Present (66 years)

Hani Rashid is an architect and educator. He co-founded the New York-based architecture firm, Asymptote Architecture with Lise Anne Couture. Early life and education Hani Rashid was born in Cairo, Egypt in 1958, his family immigrated to Ontario, Canada when he was young. His brother is industrial designer, Karim Rashid.

#533

Farshid Moussavi

Farshid Moussavi

#18897

Overall Influence

1965 - Present (59 years)

Farshid Moussavi is an Iranian-born British architect, educator, and author. She is the founder of Farshid Moussavi Architecture and a Professor in Practice of Architecture at Harvard University Graduate School of Design. The work of her London-based practice, FMA, is celebrated for projects that integrate an inventive approach to space and materials and a strong social awareness, whether they be a cultural centre such as the Museum of Contemporary Art in Cleveland or a community centre such as the Ismaili Center Houston , a social housing project in Montpellier, or an elementary school in Saclay , both in France.

#534

Bharat Bhushan

#36209

Overall Influence

1949 - Present (75 years)

Bharat Bhushan is an American engineer. He is an Ohio Eminent Scholar and the Howard D. Winbigler Professor at Ohio State University. Education Bhushan graduated with a BE in mechanical engineering from the Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani in 1970, an MS in mechanical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1971, and an MS in mechanics from the University of Colorado, Boulder in 1973. He received his PhD from CU in 1979. He also has an MBA in management from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute .

#535

Slobodan Ćuk

#17353

Overall Influence

Slobodan Ćuk is a Serbian author, inventor, business owner, electrical engineer, and professor of electrical engineering at the California Institute of Technology . The Ćuk switched-mode DC-to-DC voltage converter is named after him.

#536

Ahmed Cemal Eringen

#26088

Overall Influence

1921 - 2009 (88 years)

Ahmet Cemal Eringen was a Turkish engineering scientist. He was a professor at Princeton University and the founder of the Society of Engineering Science. The Eringen Medal is named in his honor. Education Eringen was born in Kayseri, Turkey and studied at the Technical University of Istanbul and graduated with a diploma degree in 1943 and then worked for the Turkish Aircraft Co. until 1944. In 1944–1945, he was a trainee at the Glenn L. Martin Company and in 1945 was group leader at the Turkish Air League Company. He continued his studies at the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn in New York ...

#537

Richard Avedon

#816

Overall Influence

1923 - 2004 (81 years)

Richard Avedon was an American fashion and portrait photographer. He worked for Harper's Bazaar, Vogue and Elle specializing in capturing movement in still pictures of fashion, theater and dance. An obituary published in The New York Times said that "his fashion and portrait photographs helped define America's image of style, beauty and culture for the last half-century".

#538

Ronald M. Sega

#21731

Overall Influence

1952 - Present (72 years)

Ronald "Ron" Michael Sega is an American former astronaut who is professor of systems engineering and Vice President for Energy and the Environment at the Colorado State University Research Foundation, a non-profit advocacy organization supporting CSU. He is also the Vice President and Enterprise Executive for Energy and Environment at Ohio State University. From August 2005 to August 2007, he served as Under Secretary of the Air Force. He is a retired major general in the United States Air Force and a former NASA astronaut. Sega was born in Cleveland, Ohio, he is of Slovene origin. He was married to fellow astronaut Bonnie J.

#539

Alfred Caldwell

#16578

Overall Influence

1903 - 1998 (95 years)

Alfred Caldwell was an American architect best known for his landscape architecture in and around Chicago, Illinois. Family and education Caldwell and his wife Virginia had a daughter, Carol Caldwell Dooley, born on January 25, 1931, and a son, James Allen Caldwell, born on December 12, 1933. He received a Master of Science in city planning from the Illinois Institute of Technology in 1948.

#540

Yoshiaki Arata

#11526

Overall Influence

1924 - 2018 (94 years)

Yoshiaki Arata was a Japanese physicist. Arata was one of the pioneering researchers into nuclear fusion in Japan and a former professor at Osaka University. He was reported to be a strong nationalist, speaking only Japanese in public. He received the Order of Culture in 2006.

#541

Anatoly Perminov

Anatoly Perminov

#18303

Overall Influence

1945 - Present (79 years)

Anatoly Nikolayevich Perminov is a Russian rocket scientist and a mechanical engineer. He served as the General Director of Russian Federal Space Agency in 2004–2011. He has the federal state civilian service rank of 1st class Active State Councillor of the Russian Federation.

#542

Nicholas J. Hoff

#32814

Overall Influence

1906 - 1997 (91 years)

Nicholas J. Hoff was a Hungarian-born American engineer specializing in aeronautics and astronautics, which he taught at Stanford University. Biography Hoff spent his adolescence in Budapest, where he went to the same high school that had been attended by Leo Szilard, Eugene Wigner, and John von Neumann. After high school, he enrolled at ETH Zurich, where he studied under Aurel Stodola. He graduated with an engineering degree in 1928.

#543

Franco Stella

#23804

Overall Influence

1943 - Present (81 years)

Francesco Stella , known professionally as Franco Stella, is an Italian architect. Life Stella studied at the Università Iuav di Venezia in Venice. In the early 1970s he undertook teaching and research at Gruppo Architettura. In 1973 he was professor of architecture design at the IUAV. He has been Professor of Architectural Design at the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Genoa. In architectural terms, Stella views himself as a representative of classic modern rationalism.

#544

Subrata Roy

#7630

Overall Influence

Subrata Roy is an Indian-born inventor, educator, and scientist known for his work in plasma-based flow control and plasma-based self-sterilizing technology. He is a professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of Florida and the founding director of the Applied Physics Research Group at the University of Florida.

#545

Donlyn Lyndon

#20517

Overall Influence

1936 - Present (88 years)

Donlyn Lyndon is an American Third Bay Tradition architect and the Eva Li Professor Emeritus of Architecture and Urban Design at the University of California, Berkeley. Lyndon was a co-designer of Sea Ranch, California.

#546

Aris Konstantinidis

#25889

Overall Influence

1913 - 1993 (80 years)

Aris Konstantinidis was a Greek modernist architect. Aris Konstantinidis was born in Athens and studied architecture at the Technical University of Munich from 1931 to 1936, where he came into contact with the Modern Movement in architecture. He returned to Greece in 1936 and worked for the Town Planning Department of the city of Athens and for the Ministry of Public Works. He was appointed head of the Workers Housing Organisation from 1955 to 1975 and from 1957 to 1967 of the Technical Service of the Greek National Tourism Organisation, where he planned and oversaw the construction of a series of workers' houses and Xenia hotels.

#547

Kenneth L. Johnson

#27255

Overall Influence

1925 - 2015 (90 years)

Kenneth Langstreth Johnson FRS FREng was a British engineer, Professor of Engineering at the University of Cambridge from 1977 to 1992 and a Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge. Most of his research was in the areas of tribology and contact mechanics.

#548

A. Stephen Morse

#32303

Overall Influence

1939 - Present (85 years)

A. Stephen Morse is the Dudley Professor of distributed control and adaptive control in electrical engineering at Yale University. Early life and education Morse was born in Mt. Vernon, New York. He received his B.S. from Cornell University, his M.S. from the University of Arizona, and his Ph.D. from Purdue University.

#549

Ferdinand Freudenstein

#17698

Overall Influence

1926 - 2006 (80 years)

Ferdinand Freudenstein was an American physicist and engineer known as the "Father of Modern Kinematics." Freudenstein applied digital computation to the kinematic synthesis of mechanismss. In his Ph.D. dissertation, he developed what became known as the Freudenstein equation, which uses a simple algebraic method to synthesize planar four-bar function generators.

#550

Daniela L. Rus

#11571

Overall Influence

1963 - Present (61 years)

Daniela L. Rus is a roboticist and computer scientist, Director of the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory , and the Andrew and Erna Viterbi Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

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