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,
#1651
Alta Schutte
#96300
Overall Influence
Aletta E. "Alta" Schutte is a South African hypertension and heart disease expert based in Sydney, Australia. She is a SHARP Professor and Principal Theme Lead of Cardiac, Vascular and Metabolic Medicine at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, with a joint appointment as Professorial Fellow at the George Institute for Global Health. Until 2019 she was the Director of the Hypertension in Africa Research Team , South African Research Chair and Director of the Medical Research Council Extramural Unit for Hypertension and Cardiovascular Disease at the North-West University in South Africa.
Go to Profile#1652
Jean‐paul Ortonne
#115570
Overall Influence
#1653
Alan Cuthbert
#80001
Overall Influence
1932 - 2016 (84 years)
Alan William Cuthbert, was a British pharmacologist and fellow of University College London. Life Cuthbert was born in Peterborough, England. He was a research professor at Addenbrooke's Hospital, located at the University of Cambridge.
Go to Profile#1654
Pierre Jean Meunier
#115577
Overall Influence
#1655
Mark E. Sherman
#115579
Overall Influence
#1656
Philip Stell
#101181
Overall Influence
1934 - 2004 (70 years)
Professor Philip Michael Stell was a British surgeon and historian. After a career in otolaryngology he retired early from his chair at the University of Liverpool and developed a second career as a medieval historian based in York; he was appointed MBE in 2004 "for services to history".
Go to Profile#1657
M. D. Melvin L. Marcus
#115602
Overall Influence
#1658
Ulrich Klotz
#115682
Overall Influence
#1659
Kim Michael Fox
#115705
Overall Influence
#1660
Elizabeth A. Platz
#114743
Overall Influence
Elizabeth A. Platz is an American cancer epidemiologist. As a professor at Johns Hopkins University, Platz was appointed editor-in-chief of the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention and elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Go to Profile#1661
G. Gordon Steel
#115780
Overall Influence
#1662
Brian L. Strom
#107764
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (76 years)
Brian L. Strom is the inaugural Chancellor of Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences and the Executive Vice President for Health Affairs at Rutgers University. Strom was the Executive Vice Dean for Institutional Affairs, Founding Chair of the Department of Biostatistics and Epidemiology, Founding Director of the Center for Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, and Founding Director of the Graduate Program in Epidemiology and Biostatistics, at the Perelman School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania. In addition to writing more than 650 papers and 15 books, he has been principal investigator for more than 275 grants.
Go to Profile#1663
Francine Laden
#106499
Overall Influence
Francine Laden is an American epidemiologist who is Professor of Environmental Epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Her research has investigated the environmental epidemiology of chronic disease. She serves as co-director of the Harvard University and Boston University center for research on environmental and social stressors in housing across the life course. Laden has also served on the United States Environmental Protection Agency advisory board.
Go to Profile#1664
Brian G. M. Durie
#115898
Overall Influence
#1665
Aaron E. Blair
#115928
Overall Influence
#1666
Perry B. Molinoff
#115991
Overall Influence
#1667
Deborah Greenspan
#82506
Overall Influence
Deborah Greenspan is a British-American scholar in dentistry, having been Professor and the Leland and Gladys Barber Distinguished Professor at UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center, University of California, San Francisco.
Go to Profile#1668
John Z. Ayanian
#116085
Overall Influence
#1669
Richard Gilbertson
#88508
Overall Influence
Professor Richard James Gilbertson is a paediatric oncology clinician scientist and a Senior Group Leader at the Cancer Research UK Cambridge Institute, University of Cambridge. He is the Li Ka Shing Chair of Oncology, and Director of the CRUK Cambridge Major Centre and the Children's Brain Tumour Centre of Excellence.
Go to Profile#1670
Isidro Salusky
#116172
Overall Influence
Isidro B. Salusky is an American nephrologist. Biography Salusky obtained his M.D. degree from the National University of Buenos Aires in Argentina and completed a residency in Buenos Aires. He completed a fellowship in pediatric nephrology in Paris, as well as research and clinical fellowships in Los Angeles. Salusky became a Distinguished Professor of Pediatrics and Chief, Pediatric Nephrology at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center.
Go to Profile#1671
Chi-Ming Chow
#85417
Overall Influence
Chi-Ming Chow, FRCPC, FACC, FASE, is a Canadian cardiologist at St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He is often interviewed on national media about issues involving cardiovascular health, and is regarded as an influential advocate for heart health in the Canadian Chinese community.
Go to Profile#1672
Cristina Possas
#77258
Overall Influence
1948 - Present (77 years)
Cristina Possas de Albuquerque is a Brazilian public health scientist working with infectious diseases and emerging infectious diseases from an eco-social perspective. She is a Takemi Fellow at Harvard University in Boston, where for 10 years she has been a visiting scientist and a Fulbright Fellow. She has been since 1976 a professor at FIOCRUZ in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Go to Profile#1673
Leslie Crofford
#114746
Overall Influence
Leslie J. Crofford is a professor at Vanderbilt University and the 2011 recipient of the Woman in Inflammation Science award from the International Association of Inflammation Societies. She continues to practice and research Rheumatology.
Go to Profile#1674
Sherine E. Gabriel
#116378
Overall Influence
#1675
Éric Dewailly
#88670
Overall Influence
1957 - 2014 (57 years)
Éric Dewailly was a Canadian epidemiologist and medical researcher from Quebec. He was particularly notable for his research into human toxicology and the effect of contaminants on the environment in the Arctic. A professor of medicine at Laval University and the Centre hospitalier universitaire de Québec Research Center, he was also a scientific director of the World Health Organization's Collaborative Centre in Environmental Health.
Go to Profile#1676
Gordon J. Christensen
#116455
Overall Influence
#1677
Phyllis Zee
#70441
Overall Influence
Phyllis C. Zee is the Benjamin and Virginia T. Boshes Professor in Neurology, the director of the Center for Circadian and Sleep Medicine and the chief of the Division of Sleep Medicine at the Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, Chicago. She is also the medical director of Sleep Disorders Center at Northwestern Memorial Hospital.
Go to Profile#1678
Gilles Walch
#116469
Overall Influence
#1679
John D. Brunzell
#116520
Overall Influence
#1680
Rosalind Gibson
#116605
Overall Influence
Rosalind Susan Gibson is a New Zealand nutrition academic. She is currently a professor emeritus and research professor at the University of Otago. Early life and family Gibson was born Rosalind Susan Alexander in Corbridge, Northumberland, England, on 20 November 1940. in 1963, she married geologist Ian Gibson, and the couple went on to have two children, a son and a daughter. The son died as a result of a climbing accident; the daughter became a vet in New Zealand.
Go to Profile#1681
Michael G. Hanna
#112451
Overall Influence
1963 - Present (62 years)
Michael G Hanna is Director of the UCL Institute of Neurology, University College London and professor in clinical neurology and consultant neurologist at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Queen Square, London, and also Director of the Medical Research Council Centre for Neuromuscular Disease.
Go to Profile#1682
Joseph Berger
#106756
Overall Influence
1951 - Present (74 years)
Joseph R. Berger is an American internist and neurologist who is known for his research interests in progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy , the neurological complications of HIV/AIDS, multiple sclerosis, and other inflammatory disorders of the brain. Particularly, he contributed research on why PML occurs more frequently in AIDS than in other immunosuppressive conditions.
Go to Profile#1683
Geoffrey C. Farrell
#116612
Overall Influence
#1684
Niall Patrick Quinn
#116626
Overall Influence
#1685
Charles G. Maurice
#93927
Overall Influence
1911 - 1997 (86 years)
Dr. Charles G. Maurice was an American dentist and academic. In a teaching career that spanned 37 years at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry, he began in the old Department of Applied Materia Medica and Therapeutics and ended up establishing the Department of Endodontics, becoming its first head in 1967. This was not his first pioneering effort in endodontics as he was one of the founders of the American Association of Endodontists in 1943. He also was a diplomate of the American Board of Endodontics, and was a contributor to the textbook Endodontology. The Charles G....
Go to Profile#1686
Jennifer Beard
#57743
Overall Influence
Jennifer Beard is an American physician who is Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Global Health at Boston University School of Public Health , associate editor of Public Health Post, leads the BUSPH Public Health Writing Program and also directs the MPH certificates in Global Health and Program Management.
Go to Profile#1687
Éric Vicaut
#116700
Overall Influence
#1688
Philip. R. Bromage
#116701
Overall Influence
#1689
Kurt Huber
#116708
Overall Influence
#1690
Nobuyuki Ito
#116783
Overall Influence
#1691
Gerardo Van Den Hoek
#116804
Overall Influence
#1692
Uché Blackstock
#92467
Overall Influence
1977 - Present (48 years)
Uché Blackstock is an American emergency physician and former associate professor of emergency medicine at the New York University School of Medicine. She is the founder and CEO of Advancing Health Equity, which has a primary mission to engage with healthcare and related organizations around bias and racism in healthcare with the goal of mobilizing for health equity and eradicating racialized health inequities. During the COVID-19 pandemic Blackstock used social media to share her experiences and concerns as a physician working on the front lines and on racial health disparities and inequities exposed by the pandemic.
Go to Profile#1693
Cornelis J. H. Van De Velde
#116828
Overall Influence
#1694
Viktor Savelyev
#106044
Overall Influence
1928 - 2013 (85 years)
Viktor Sergeyevich Savelyev was a Soviet and Russian surgeon. He was a full member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, from 1997 until his death, and of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences. He was also a member of the Presidium of the Academy of Medical Sciences and Head of the Department of Surgery of the Russian State Medical University. He died on 25 December 2013 in Moscow, Russia at the age of 85.
Go to Profile#1695
Graham Hill
#47278
Overall Influence
F. W. Graham Hill is a Zimbabwean veterinary surgeon and academic. He was Vice Chancellor of the University of Zimbabwe from 1997 to 2002. As a researcher, he published on subjects such as the rabies vaccination and its epidemiology carcinoma in cattle, snake bites of small animals and diseases of the small intestines of dogs. His term as Vice-Chancellor was marked by frequent staff strikes and student disturbances, and university and government crackdowns in response. He was accused of intervening in the academic process to favour senior government officials.
Go to Profile#1696
Robert J. Heine
#116899
Overall Influence
#1697
Philip E. Bernatz
#98060
Overall Influence
1921 - 2010 (89 years)
Philip Eugene Bernatz was an eminent American physician and thoracic surgeon at the Mayo Clinic, and an international authority on the diagnosis and treatment of thymoma and other tumors of the chest. Bernatz was born on April 18, 1921, in Decorah, Iowa, as one of four children of Frank and Martha Bernatz, and he died on October 6, 2010, in Rochester, Minnesota.
Go to Profile#1698
Marnix Van Holsbeeck
#116983
Overall Influence
1957 - Present (68 years)
Marnix van Holsbeeck is the director of musculoskeletal radiology in the Department of Radiology and director of radiology in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at the Henry Ford Health System. He is an authority in the field of musculoskeletal radiology.
Go to Profile#1699
Giovanni Rezza
#116991
Overall Influence
1954 - Present (71 years)
#1700
Lester Breslow
#117081
Overall Influence
