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 Medical,
#951
Theodore A. Slotkin
#90743
Overall Influence
#952
Robert J. Cousins
#87563
Overall Influence
1941 - Present (84 years)
Robert J. Cousins is an American nutritional biochemist who has researched the metabolism of heavy metalss, especially zinc. He has served as president of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology and the American Society for Nutrition . He was recognized with membership in the National Academy of Sciences in 2000 and served as editor of the Annual Review of Nutrition for ten years.
Go to Profile#953
Marjo van der Knaap
#65995
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (67 years)
Marjo S. van der Knaap is a Dutch professor of pediatric neurology at VU University Amsterdam and Amsterdam University Medical Centers. She was a winner of the 2008 Spinoza Prize. Her research focuses on white matter disorders.
Go to Profile#954
Philippe Moreau
#91009
Overall Influence
#955
Garen Wintemute
#48663
Overall Influence
Garen J. Wintemute is an emergency medicine physician at UC Davis Medical Center, in the US state of California, where he is the director of the Violence Prevention Research Program. He conducts research in the fields of injury epidemiology and the prevention of firearm violence. He has been named a "hero of medicine" by Time magazine. He is the director of the University of California Firearm Violence Research Center, which was established in 2017; the center is the first state-funded gun violence research center in the country.
Go to Profile#956
Steffanie A. Strathdee
#78771
Overall Influence
1966 - Present (59 years)
Steffanie A. Strathdee is the Associate Dean of Global Health Sciences, Harold Simon Distinguished Professor at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine and Co-Director at the Center for Innovative Phage Applications and Therapeutics. She is known for her work on HIV research and prevention programmes in Tijuana.
Go to Profile#957
Tadashi Inagami
#91115
Overall Influence
#958
Alastair Compston
#86493
Overall Influence
1948 - Present (77 years)
David Alastair Standish Compston is a British neurologist. He is an emeritus professor of neurology in the Department of Clinical Neurosciences at the University of Cambridge and an emeritus fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge.
Go to Profile#959
Dan Atar
#87711
Overall Influence
1959 - Present (66 years)
Dan Atar is a clinical cardiologist, researcher and professor. He is head of research at Oslo University Hospital, Div. of Medicine, and a full professor at the Institute of Clinical Sciences of the University of Oslo, Norway. He is Editor-in- Chief of the scientific journal Cardiology.
Go to Profile#960
Peter Horby
#81112
Overall Influence
Sir Peter William Horby is a British physician, epidemiologist, Moh Family Foundation Professor of Emerging Infections and Global Health, and Director of the Pandemic Sciences Institute at the University of Oxford. He is the founder, and former director of the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit in Hanoi, Vietnam which was founded in 2006. In 2014, Horby established the Epidemic Research Group Oxford . ERGO incorporates a number of international projects such as the European Commission funded PREPARE, the African coaLition for Epidemic Research, Response and Training , and the International Severe Acute Respiratory and emerging Infection Consortium .
Go to Profile#961
Kathryn Dewey
#88554
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (73 years)
Kathryn Gertrude Dewey is an American nutritionist. She is a Distinguished Professor Emerita in the Department of Nutrition at the University of California, Davis. Her studies in nutrition led to adaptations to the World Health Organization's recommendations for infants.
Go to Profile#962
Adel Mahmoud
#32818
Overall Influence
1941 - 2018 (77 years)
Adel K. Mahmoud was an Egyptian-born American doctor and expert in infectious diseases. He was credited with helping with the development of the Gardasil HPV vaccine and the rotavirus vaccine while serving as President of Merck Vaccines. Both the HPV and rotavirus vaccines were under development prior to Mahmoud joining Merck Vaccine Division; he assisted in ensuring that they remained a priority for Merck to continue development to commercial launch. After retiring from Merck he became a professor at Princeton University.
Go to Profile#963
Gilberto de Nucci
#49749
Overall Influence
1958 - Present (67 years)
Gilberto De Nucci is a noted Brazilian physician, scientist and university professor in the field of pharmacology. Education He was born in Campinas, state of São Paulo, Brazil. His father was a well-known physician in the city. De Nucci studied medicine at the Medical School of Ribeirão Preto of the University of São Paulo, in Ribeirão Preto , where he also did his initial scientific studies in the Department of Pharmacology. Soon after graduation he moved to London, England. He worked from 1982 to 1985 with Dr. John R. Vane, 1982 Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine, at the Wellcome Research Laboratories, in London, England.
Go to Profile#964
Miriam E. Nelson
#24598
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (65 years)
Miriam E. Nelson is an American health and nutrition scholar, policy advisor, and author. She is the former president and CEO of Newman's Own Foundation, an independent, private foundation formed in 2005 by actor and race car driver Paul Newman to sustain the legacy of his philanthropic work. An international leader, scientist, and social entrepreneur, Nelson has been the principal investigator of multiple studies on exercise, nutrition, and public health, which have informed national public policy initiatives to improve public health. She had a controversial tenure as president of Hampshire ...
Go to Profile#965
Donna Baird
#41852
Overall Influence
Donna Day Baird is an American epidemiologist and evolutionary-population biologist. She is a senior investigator at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. She is known for her research in reproductive health through NIEHS.
Go to Profile#966
Carol Remmer Angle
#68099
Overall Influence
1927 - Present (98 years)
Carol Remmer Angle is an American pediatrician, nephrologist, and toxicologist. Angle is known as one of the nation's leading researchers on lead poisoning. She is professor emeritus at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, Nebraska. Angle joined UNMC in 1954 and was one of the first women to serve as chair of an academic medical department . She also served as chief of pediatric nephrology, director of the pediatric intensive care unit, and director of medical toxicology. In 1957, Angle along with Dr. Matilda McIntire, founded one of the country's first poison control centers.
Go to Profile#967
Johanna T. Dwyer
#87402
Overall Influence
Johanna T. Dwyer is an American nutrition scientist and dietitian. She is a senior scientist at the National Institutes of Health's Office of Dietary Supplements and director of the Frances Stern Nutrition Center at Tufts Medical Center. Dwyer is a professor of nutrition at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy.
Go to Profile#968
Torsten Zuberbier
#75362
Overall Influence
1962 - Present (63 years)
Torsten Zuberbier is a German dermatologist and allergologist. Scientific career After completing his Abitur in 1981, Torsten Zuberbier studied medicine at Free University of Berlin from 1983 to 1990. From 1990 to 1994, he completed his specialist training in the Department of Dermatology at the Virchow Clinic in Berlin, where he also became a senior physician in 1995 and qualified as a professor in 1996 with his work on the topic of differentiation and functional relations in human mast cells.
Go to Profile#969
Torben Jørgensen
#91742
Overall Influence
1946 - Present (79 years)
Torben Jørgensen is a Danish epidemiologist. He was awarded the Marie og August Krogh Prisen in 2016. Jørgensen has published more than 500 scientific articles.
Go to Profile#970
James E. Crowe
#78417
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (64 years)
James Earl Crowe Jr. is an American immunologist and pediatrician as well as Professor of Pediatrics and Pathology, Microbiology, and Immunology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Education and career James Crowe was born August 14, 1961, in Nashville, Tennessee. He received his B.S. from Davidson College in 1983. Then went on to medical school at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, completing his M.D. in 1987. He continued at the University of North Carolina for his pediatric internship and residency from 1987 to 1990. Following his medical training, Crowe moved to the U.S. ...
Go to Profile#971
Werner Hacke
#91771
Overall Influence
#972
Peter Huttenlocher
#76190
Overall Influence
1931 - 2013 (82 years)
Peter Richard Huttenlocher was a German-American pediatric neurologist and neuroscientist who discovered how the brain develops in children. He is considered to be one of the fathers of developmental cognitive neuroscience.
Go to Profile#973
Teguest Guerma
#24157
Overall Influence
Teguest Guerma is an Ethiopian medical doctor specializing in public health and HIV/AIDS. Guerma is appointed by the African Medical and Research Foundation Board of Directors as Director General in June 2010. She has been the Associate Director of the HIV/AIDS Department of the World Health Organization between 2004–2010. She has started her career in HIV/AIDS in Burundi and has since extensively worked in Africa and South East Asia, including as country representative for the World Health Organization and Regional Advisor of HIV/AIDS for the Africa Regional Office of the WHO. She also repr...
Go to Profile#974
Williami Grossman
#91903
Overall Influence
#975
Mihai Gheorghiade
#91949
Overall Influence
#976
Patrick Chinnery
#87125
Overall Influence
1968 - Present (57 years)
Professor Patrick Francis Chinnery, FRCP, FRCPath, FMedSci, is a neurologist, clinician scientist, and Wellcome Trust Principal Research Fellow based in the Medical Research Council Mitochondrial Biology Unit and the University of Cambridge, where he is also Professor of Neurology and Head of the Department of Clinical Neurosciences.
Go to Profile#977
Carlos Augusto Monteiro
#92047
Overall Influence
#978
Lynn Goldman
#61283
Overall Influence
1951 - Present (74 years)
Lynn R. Goldman is the Dean of the Milken Institute School of Public Health at George Washington University. She is an American public health physician, a pediatrician and an epidemiologist. Early life and education Goldman was born in Galveston, Texas, United States. She graduated with a B.Sc. in Conservation of Natural Resources from the University of California at Berkeley, Berkeley College of Natural Resources, in 1976 and subsequently obtained an M.Sc. in Health and Medical Science in 1979.
Go to Profile#979
Anthony J. Furlan
#92401
Overall Influence
#980
Hugues Duffau
#92543
Overall Influence
1966 - Present (59 years)
#981
Marek Malik
#92550
Overall Influence
#982
David H. Gutmann
#86582
Overall Influence
David Hillel Gutmann is an American neurologist-neuroscientist. He teaches at Washington University in St. Louis, where he is the Donald O. Schnuck Family Professor, and Director of the Washington University Neurofibromatosis Center. He is an international expert in Neurofibromatosis, pioneering the use of preclinical models to understand brain tumors and neurodevelopmental delays in children with NF1.
Go to Profile#983
Michael Petrides
#92609
Overall Influence
1959 - Present (66 years)
#984
André Briend
#46114
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (25 years)
André Briend is a French pediatric nutritionist best known for his 1996 co-formulation of Plumpy'nut, a Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food , with Dr. Mark Manary. Starting in 1994, Briend, who at the time worked at Institut de recherche pour le développement, worked with Michel Lescanne to develop variants of renutrition products in solid form. At the time, the WHO-recommended diet for the treatment of severe malnutrition required clean water, a commodity only available in hospitals in most developing countries. These trial products were ultimately discarded for not meeting the requirements of good shelf-life, pleasant taste, or logistic simplicity.
Go to Profile#985
Tony McMichael
#83597
Overall Influence
1942 - 2014 (72 years)
Professor Anthony John McMichael AO FTSE MBBS PhD was an Australian epidemiologist who retired from the Australian National University in 2012. Background McMichael grew up in Adelaide, and graduated in medicine from the University of Adelaide . As a student he spent a summer volunteering at a leprosy colony in New Delhi, India where he saw how patients were treated as social outcasts suffering from the stigma of a disfiguring disease although they were no longer contagious. The following year, whilst on a similar service trip to Papua New Guinea he met social sciences student Judith Healy, whom he married shortly after graduation.
Go to Profile#986
Adele Green
#76771
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (73 years)
Adele Chandler Green is an Australian epidemiological senior scientist at the QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute in Brisbane and is the institute's Head of Cancer and Population Studies Group.
Go to Profile#987
Thomas F. Babor
#92690
Overall Influence
1944 - Present (81 years)
#988
Amos D. Korczyn
#92741
Overall Influence
1940 - Present (85 years)
#989
O. James Garden
#81979
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (72 years)
Olivier James Garden, is a British surgeon and academic. He holds the Regius Chair of Clinical Surgery at the University of Edinburgh and the president of the International Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary Association from 2012 to 2014. Garden performed Scotland's first liver transplant in Edinburgh in 1992 and founded the Scottish Liver Transplant Programme.
Go to Profile#990
Ann McNeill
#73596
Overall Influence
Professor Ann McNeill is a British academic and tobacco policy expert. She is currently a professor of Tobacco Addiction in the National Addictions Centre at the King's College London Institute of Psychiatry and deputy director of the UK Centre for Tobacco Control Studies.
Go to Profile#991
Alice S. Whittemore
#38908
Overall Influence
Alice Segers Whittemore is an American epidemiologist and biostatistician who studies the effects of genetics and lifestyle on cancer, after an earlier career as a pure mathematician studying group theory. She works as a professor of health research and policy and of biomedical data science at Stanford University, and has served as president of the International Biometric Society.
Go to Profile#992
Borje E. Christopher Nordin
#92822
Overall Influence
#993
Gitte Moos Knudsen
#68085
Overall Influence
1959 - Present (66 years)
Gitte Moos Knudsen is a Danish translational neurobiologist and clinical neurologist, and Clinical Professor and Chief Physician at the Department of Clinical Medicine, Neurology, Psychiatry and Sensory Sciences, at Copenhagen University Hospital. She graduated from Lyngby Statsskole, just north of Copenhagen, before gaining entrance to medicine, where she received her MD from University of Copenhagen in 1984, and became a Board certified user of radioisotopes in 1986. She sat the FMGEMS exam in 1989. She became Board certified in neurology in 1994 and received her DMSc from University of Copenhagen in 1994.
Go to Profile#994
David H. Van Thiel
#92850
Overall Influence
#995
Kenneth S. Kosik
#81785
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (75 years)
Kenneth S. Kosik is an American neurologist, author, researcher and professor in neuroscience at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Recent contributions includes a significant discovery in understanding the way human embryonic stem cells function. He has contributed to novel thinking about how to reduce risk for getting Alzheimer's disease and reduce the impact of this illness on our communities. He was the founder and executive director of Cognitive Fitness & Innovative Therapies, followed by the Cottage Center for Brain Fitness. Kosik provided much of the original data on the larg...
Go to Profile#996
Zena Stein
#82338
Overall Influence
1922 - 2021 (99 years)
Zena Athene Stein was a South African epidemiologist, activist and doctor. She was professor of epidemiology and psychiatry at Columbia University. Biography Stein was born on July 7, 1922, to Lithuanian Jewish immigrants in Durban, South Africa. Her father was a mathematics professor at Natal Technical College, and her mother was a homemaker. She completed a BA and MS in History at the University of Cape Town, and a medical degree from the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg.
Go to Profile#997
Eli J. Glatstein
#93051
Overall Influence
#998
I.‐min Lee
#93053
Overall Influence
#999
C. Norman Shealy
#63013
Overall Influence
1932 - Present (93 years)
Clyde Norman Shealy is a North American neurosurgeon. Education Shealy graduated from Duke University School of Medicine, and completed his training at Duke University Medical Center, Barnes-Jewish Hospital, and Massachusetts General Hospital. Shealy is also a certified minister of the Nemenhah ITO.
Go to Profile#1000
Patricia Numann
#78987
Overall Influence
1941 - Present (84 years)
Patricia Joy Numann is an American endocrine surgeon. She is the founder of the Association of Women Surgeons, former president of the American College of Surgeons, and professor emeritus at the State University of New York Upstate Medical University.
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