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 …
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List of the most influential people in Engineering,
#3101
John N Weinstein
#109226
Overall Influence
#3102
Tung Hua Lin
#66726
Overall Influence
1911 - 2007 (96 years)
Tung Hua Lin was a Chinese-American aerospace and structural engineer best known for designing China's first twin engine aircraft during World War II. Early life and career Lin was born in Chungking in May 1911. His grandfather was head of the local telegraph agency. In 1914, his family moved to Beijing. He enrolled in Huiwen High School in 1924, graduating in 1928. After graduation, he entered Yenching University, majoring in physics, but the following year transferred to Chiaotung University's Tangshan, Hebei campus , graduating with a Bachelor of Science degree in 1933. He then won a Chinese National Fellowship to study in the United States in 1933.
Go to Profile#3103
Justin Schwartz
#109279
Overall Influence
Justin Schwartz is an American nuclear engineer. Since August 15, 2017, he has served as the Harold and Inge Marcus Dean of Engineering at Penn State College of Engineering. During his earlier tenure at North Carolina State University as head of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, he received that university's diversity award in 2011 for expanding the female faculty of the department twofold and hiring the first professors who were minorities.
Go to Profile#3104
Harvey Cantor
#67872
Overall Influence
Harvey Cantor is an American immunologist known for his studies of the development and immunological function of T lymphocytes. Cantor is currently the Baruj Benacerraf Professor of Immunology and Microbiology at the Harvard Medical School.
Go to Profile#3105
David Bailey
#3619
Overall Influence
1938 - Present (86 years)
David Royston Bailey is an English photographer and director, most widely known for his fashion photography and portraiture, and role in shaping the image of the Swinging Sixties. Early life David Bailey was born at Whipps Cross University Hospital, Leytonstone, to Herbert Bailey, a tailor's cutter, and his wife Gladys, a machinist. From the age of three he lived in East Ham.
Go to Profile#3106
Jack Keil Wolf.
#109310
Overall Influence
#3107
David Miller
#74984
Overall Influence
1944 - Present (80 years)
David E. Miller is an American architect. He is a co-founder, with Robert Hull of the Miller/Hull Partnership , and an architecture professor at the University of Washington where he served as Chair of the UW Department of Architecture from 2007 to 2015.
Go to Profile#3108
Jeffrey A. Bilmes
#109344
Overall Influence
#3109
Peter Bialobrzeski
#38627
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (63 years)
Peter Bialobrzeski is a photographer and a professor of photography at the University of the Arts Bremen in Germany. Bialobrzeski originally studied politics and sociology in Germany before he studied photography at University of Essen and at the London College of Printing .
Go to Profile#3110
Edward Greitzer
#99780
Overall Influence
Edward M. Greitzer is an American physicist currently the H. N. Slater Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Greitzer was elected as a member into the National Academy of Engineering in 1995 for contributions to aircraft gas-turbine compressor aerodynamics and leadership of the MIT Gas Turbine Laboratory. He is also a Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Royal Academy of Engineering and ASME.
Go to Profile#3111
Kang L. Wang
#91238
Overall Influence
1941 - Present (83 years)
Kang Lung Wang is recognized as the discoverer of chiral Majorana fermions by IUPAP. Born in Lukang, Changhua, Taiwan, in 1941, Wang received his BS degree from National Cheng Kung University and his MS and PhD degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 1970 to 1972 he was the Assistant Professor at MIT. From 1972 to 1979, he worked at the General Electric Corporate Research and Development Center as a physicist/engineer. In 1979 he joined the Electrical Engineering Department of UCLA, where he is a Professor and leads the Device Research Laboratory . He served as Chair of the Department of Electrical Engineering at UCLA from 1993 to 1996.
Go to Profile#3112
Thomas J. Jackson
#109405
Overall Influence
#3113
James J. Coleman
#97907
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (74 years)
James J. Coleman is an electrical engineer who worked at Bell Labs, Rockwell International, and the University of Illinois, Urbana. He is best known for his work on semiconductor lasers, materials and devices including strained-layer indium gallium arsenide lasers and selective area epitaxy. Coleman is a Fellow of the IEEE and a member of the US National Academy of Engineering.
Go to Profile#3114
Thomas L. Marzetta
#109420
Overall Influence
#3115
Peter Asbeck
#100828
Overall Influence
Peter Asbeck is an American engineer, currently the Skyworks Professor in High Performance Communications Devices and Circuits at the University of California, San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering, and a publisher author. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering. for contributions to heterojunction bipolar transistor and integrated circuit technology. He is a power amplifier expert. In 2000, Peter Asbeck was elevated to IEEE fellow for development of heterostructure bipolar transistors and applications.
Go to Profile#3116
Lawrence H. Bennett
#109467
Overall Influence
#3117
John O. Simonds
#74678
Overall Influence
1913 - 2005 (92 years)
John Ormsbee Simonds was born in Jamestown, North Dakota on March 11, 1913. He was a visionary landscape architect, planner, educator, and environmentalist. Simonds was an original modernist landscape architect and one of the most influential and well-known of his time.
Go to Profile#3118
Mark Burry
#81721
Overall Influence
1957 - Present (67 years)
Mark Cameron Burry is a New Zealand architect. He is the Foundation Director of Swinburne University of Technology’s Smart Cities Research Institute. Previous to that, he was the Professor of Innovation and Director of the Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory and founding Director of the Design Research Institute at RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia. He is also executive architect and researcher at the Sagrada Familia basilica in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain.
Go to Profile#3119
David Hight
#103570
Overall Influence
1943 - Present (81 years)
David William Hight is a senior consultant at the Geotechnical Consulting Group, a company providing high-level expertise in the field of geotechnical engineering and well known for bridging the gap between research and engineering practice.
Go to Profile#3120
Jennifer Taylor
#67470
Overall Influence
1935 - 2015 (80 years)
Jennifer Evelyn Taylor was an Australian architect, professor, critic and author who made a significant contribution to writing on contemporary Australian, Japanese and South Pacific architecture. Biography Australian by birth, Taylor began studying architecture at the School of Architecture, Oxford Brookes University after taking a course in nursing. She then completed a B.Arch and M.Arch at the University of Washington, Seattle. Her Master of Architecture was in part by thesis entitled, An Inquiry into Some Aspects of Recent Unorthodox Trends in Architecture.
Go to Profile#3121
Aziza Chaouni
#104848
Overall Influence
1977 - Present (47 years)
Aziza Chaouni is a Moroccan architect who teaches at the University of Toronto. Detail She is the founder of Aziza Chaouni Projects and associate professor at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design in Toronto. She leads Designing Ecological Tourism , "a collaborative research platform that investigates the challenges faced by ecotourism in the developing world."
Go to Profile#3122
Michael Otto
#109663
Overall Influence
#3123
Thomas Thum
#109719
Overall Influence
1974 - Present (50 years)
#3124
Le Yi Wang
#102621
Overall Influence
Le Yi Wang is a professor of electrical engineering at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan. Wang received his master's degree from the Department of Computer Science and Automation, Shanghai Institute of Mechanical Engineering in 1982, and then his Ph.D. from the Department of Electrical Engineering, McGill University in 1990. He was named Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers in 2012 "for contributions to system identification and the analysis of system complexity".
Go to Profile#3125
Nicolaas Berend Ing Westerhof
#109723
Overall Influence
#3126
Paul S. Devrouax
#82484
Overall Influence
1942 - 2010 (68 years)
Paul S. Devrouax , was an American architect. He founded the architectural design firm of Devrouax+Purnell, in Washington, D.C. He helped design the Verizon Center, Nationals Park, the Walter E. Washington Convention Center, and the D.C. headquarters of Freddie Mac and Pepco. He co-designed the African-American Civil War Memorial, and provided design adjustments to the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial.
Go to Profile#3127
Alexandria Boehm
#86015
Overall Influence
Alexandria Boehm is an American scientist whose field of study is civil and environmental engineering. She studies sources, fate and transport of pathogens outside the human body, and coastal water quality. Boehm is a senior fellow at Stanford University's Woods Institute for the Environment, faculty fellow at Stanford University's Center for Innovation in Global Health, and an associate professor in Stanford University's Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering.
Go to Profile#3128
Wilbur Norman Christiansen
#42740
Overall Influence
1913 - 2007 (94 years)
Wilbur Norman "Chris" Christiansen was a pioneer Australian radio astronomer and electrical engineer. Family The son of Wilhelm Christiansen , and Ilma Clarice Christiansen , née Jones, Wilbur Norman Christiansen was born in Elsternwick, Victoria on 9 August 1913.
Go to Profile#3129
Dwijesh Dutta Majumdar
#19750
Overall Influence
Dwijesh Kumar Dutta Majumder INSA was a Professor Emeritus in the Computer and Communication Sciences Division of the Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata and Honorary Director-Secretary of the Institute of Cybernetics Systems and Information Technology in the same city. He is also an Emeritus Scientist of the Council of Scientific & Industrial Research, operated by the Government of India.
Go to Profile#3130
Senentxu Lanceros‐méndez
#109776
Overall Influence
#3131
Richard I. Fisher
#109782
Overall Influence
#3132
David Mautner Himmelblau
#109793
Overall Influence
#3133
Zenon Mróz
#109798
Overall Influence
#3134
Derrick Wing Kwan Ng
#109804
Overall Influence
#3135
Takao Someya
#109828
Overall Influence
#3136
Reza N. Jazar
#97583
Overall Influence
Reza Nakhaie Jazar also known as Reza N. Jazar is a professor of Mechanical engineering at RMIT University. Education Reza received his master's degree from Tehran Polytechnic in 1990, specializing in robotics. He acquired his PhD from Sharif University of Technology in Nonlinear Dynamics and Applied Mathematics, in 1997.
Go to Profile#3137
James S Goodwin
#109844
Overall Influence
#3138
Garrett John Gross
#109854
Overall Influence
#3139
Mitsuo Wada Takeda
#109856
Overall Influence
#3140
Venkataramanan Balakrishnan
#89441
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (24 years)
Venkataramanan "Ragu" Balakrishnan is an Indian–American engineer. He is the Charles H. Phipps Dean at the Case School of Engineering, having previously served as the Michael and Katherine Birck Head Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Purdue University. In 2012, Balakrishnan was named a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers for his contributions to convex optimization in control systems.
Go to Profile#3141
Jon Wozencroft
#44831
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (66 years)
Jon Wozencroft is a graphic designer, author and instructor. Wozencroft founded Touch, an independent multimedia publishing company. Between 1982 and 1986 Touch "released around 15 products, concentrating on producing interactive, audiovisual magazines such as Feature Mist and Touch Travel, both of which sold over 5000 copies without any advertising ." Touch is still active today.
Go to Profile#3142
Alan H. Epstein
#63650
Overall Influence
Alan H. Epstein is a distinguished aeronautical engineer. He received his S.B., S.M. and Ph.D. degrees from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1971, 1972 and 1975 respectively. At M.I.T. he was the R.C. Maclaurin Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics and the Director of the Gas Turbine Laboratory.
Go to Profile#3143
Nicole Eisenman
#30943
Overall Influence
1965 - Present (59 years)
Nicole Eisenman is a French-born American artist known for her oil paintings and sculptures. She has been awarded the Guggenheim Fellowship , the Carnegie Prize , and has thrice been included in the Whitney Biennial . On September 29, 2015, she won a MacArthur Fellowship award for "restoring the representation of the human form a cultural significance that had waned during the ascendancy of abstraction in the 20th century."
Go to Profile#3144
Sally Benson
#61243
Overall Influence
Sally M. Benson is a professor of energy engineering at Stanford University. In 2014, she was appointed as director of the Precourt Institute for Energy, the university's hub of energy research and education. Benson will continue on as director of Stanford's Global Climate and Energy Project , a position she has had since 2007.
Go to Profile#3145
Turgut '. Sarp '. Sarpkaya
#109951
Overall Influence
#3146
D. Craig Miller
#109979
Overall Influence
#3147
Thomas Herzog
#80870
Overall Influence
1941 - Present (83 years)
Thomas Herzog is a German architect from Munich known for his focus on climate and energy use through the use of technologically advanced architectural skins. He began with an interest in pneumatics and became Germany's youngest architecture professor at the age of 32. He established his firm Herzog + Partner in 1983.
Go to Profile#3148
Ronnie J. M. Belmans
#109992
Overall Influence
#3149
Elfyn Richards
#56499
Overall Influence
1914 - 1995 (81 years)
Professor Elfyn John Richards was a Welsh aeronautical engineer and acoustical engineer, the first professor of either of these subjects at Southampton University, where he founded the Institute of Sound and Vibration Research, and was the second Vice-Chancellor of Loughborough University of Technology.
Go to Profile#3150
Amit X Garg
#110022
Overall Influence
