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 Physics,
#6651
Masasuke Yoshida
#150537
Overall Influence
#6652
Susanne Yelin
#145774
Overall Influence
1968 - Present (58 years)
Susanne F. Yelin is a German physicist specializing in theoretical quantum optics and known for her work in quantum coherence and superradiance. She is a professor of physics at the University of Connecticut, a professor of physics in residence at Harvard University, and vice director of the Max Planck/Harvard Research Center for Quantum Optics.
Go to Profile#6653
Hideo Aoki
#150568
Overall Influence
#6654
Murray G. Ross
#12986
Overall Influence
1910 - 2000 (90 years)
Murray George Ross, was a Canadian sociologist, author, and academic administrator. He was the founding president of Toronto's York University and served in that role from 1959 to 1970. Born in Sydney, Nova Scotia, the son of James Alway Ross and Sarah Agnes Kay, Ross received a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics and sociology from Acadia University in 1936. He received a Master of Arts degree in sociology from the University of Toronto in 1938. He did post-graduate work in sociology at the University of Chicago in 1939 and in Social psychology from Columbia University in 1949. He received a LL.D.
Go to Profile#6655
Victor Yakhot
#150626
Overall Influence
#6656
Aleksandr Matveyev
#30250
Overall Influence
1926 - 2010 (84 years)
Aleksandr Konstantinovich Matveyev was a Russian linguist known for his works in toponymics , onomastics , and etymology . Biography Aleksandr Matveyev was born in Sverdlovsk but because of World War II he entered and graduated from the Khabarovsk University. Starting in 1952 he worked at the Ural State University in Sverdlovsk. In 1970 he defended his second thesis and became professor of the philological department. Since 1961 – chief of the chair of Russian language and general linguistics at the Ural State University. In 1988 he received the title of Scientist Emeritus of Russia. In 1991...
Go to Profile#6657
Olivier Le Fèvre
#144003
Overall Influence
1960 - 2020 (60 years)
Olivier Le Fèvre was a French astrophysicist who studied galaxies using multi-object spectroscopy. Personal life He was born in Saint-Cloud, Hauts-de-Seine, on 21 November 1960. He started as an amateur astronomer before becoming a professional one. He had two daughters. He moved to Marseilles in 1997, and enjoyed cycling and surfing. He was diagnosed with a brain tumor, and after 2.5 years he died of it on 25 June 2020.
Go to Profile#6658
Nils G. Walter
#90624
Overall Influence
1966 - Present (60 years)
Nils G. Walter, Dr. Ing., is the Francis S. Collins Collegiate Professor of Chemistry, Biophysics, and Biological Chemistry at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Research in the Nils Walter Lab focuses on non-coding RNA through the lens of single molecule techniques. He is the Founding Director of the Single Molecule Analysis in real-Time Center at Michigan. In addition, Walter is the Founding Co-Director for the University of Michigan Center for RNA Biomedicine whose mission is to enrich the university’s intellectual and training environment around RNA Biomedicine. He is currently an Ass...
Go to Profile#6659
Karin Dahmen
#117645
Overall Influence
1969 - Present (57 years)
Karin Andrea Sabine Dahmen is a German condensed matter physicist whose research interests include non-equilibrium thermodynamics, critical phenomena, crackling noise, pattern formation, and quenched disorder, with wide applications of these topics to phenomena such as earthquakes, avalanches, variable stars, and population dynamics. She is a professor of physics at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign.
Go to Profile#6660
Guangbin Dong
#150700
Overall Influence
#6661
Jari P. Turunen
#150712
Overall Influence
#6662
Jean-Marie André
#48413
Overall Influence
1944 - 2023 (79 years)
Jean-Marie André was a Belgian scientist and professor of Theoretical and Chemical Physics at the Facultés Universitaires Notre-Dame de la Paix in Belgium. He made important contributions to polymer chemistry. In 1984, he was awarded the Medal of the International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science , and in 1991, he was awarded the Francqui Prize on Exact Sciences. He was a member of the IAQMS.
Go to Profile#6663
Guenter Sigl
#150739
Overall Influence
1964 - Present (62 years)
#6664
Judith Pipher
#90786
Overall Influence
1940 - 2022 (82 years)
Judith Lynn Pipher was a Canadian-born American astrophysicist and observational astronomer. She was Professor Emerita of Astronomy at the University of Rochester and directed the C. E. K. Mees Observatory from 1979 to 1994. She made important contributions to the development of infrared detector arrays in space telescopes.
Go to Profile#6665
Peter V. E. McClintock
#77883
Overall Influence
1940 - Present (86 years)
Peter Vaughan Elsmere McClintock is notable for his scientific work on superfluids and stochastic nonlinear dynamics. Education He received the B.Sc. degree in physics in 1962 and the D.Sc. degree from Queen's University, Belfast, Northern Ireland. He completed his D.Phil. at Oxford University in 1966, under Harold Max Rosenberg, with a thesis entitled Experiments on Spin Phonon Interactions in the area of paramagnetic crystalss at very low temperatures.
Go to Profile#6666
Thomas Pertsch
#150760
Overall Influence
#6667
Harvey S. Leff
#99738
Overall Influence
1937 - Present (89 years)
Harvey S. Leff is a United States physicist and physics teacher who is known primarily for his research and expository articles in physics, focusing on energy, entropy, Maxwell's demon, and the foundations of thermodynamics. He introduced the 'energy spreading' metaphor for entropy change.
Go to Profile#6668
Jen-Chieh Peng
#148354
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (77 years)
Jen-Chieh Peng is an experimental nuclear physicist at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. Education and career Peng earned his bachelor's degree in physics from Tunghai University in Taiwan in 1970 and his Ph.D. in nuclear physics from the University of Pittsburgh in 1975. He worked as a researcher at the Centre d'Études Nucléaires de Saclay in France before joining the Physics Division of Los Alamos National Laboratory in 1978. Peng joined the faculty at Illinois Physics in 2002 as a full professor.
Go to Profile#6669
Carlos‐josé Gómez‐garcía
#150795
Overall Influence
#6670
Miguel C. Seabra
#150802
Overall Influence
#6671
Howard J. Schnitzer
#150826
Overall Influence
#6672
Kunihiko Nishiizumi
#150835
Overall Influence
#6673
Marc R. Nuwer
#150875
Overall Influence
#6674
Marcos Rigol
#150895
Overall Influence
#6675
Timothy J. Fuller‐rowell
#150923
Overall Influence
#6676
Hiromichi Kataura
#32198
Overall Influence
1959 - Present (67 years)
is a Japanese scientist known for his work on synthesis and characterization of single-wall and double-wall carbon nanotubes and on encapsulation of water, fullerenes and other organic molecules into carbon nanotubes.
Go to Profile#6677
Ayyappanpillai Ajayaghosh
#73078
Overall Influence
1962 - Present (64 years)
Ayyappanpillai Ajayaghosh is a research scientist/academician in the domain of interdisciplinary chemistry, and the former Director of the National Institute for Interdisciplinary Science and Technology. He is known for his studies on supramolecular assemblies, organogels, photoresponsive materials, chemosensory and security materials systems and is an elected fellow of all the three major Indian science academies viz. the National Academy of Sciences, India, Indian National Science Academy and the Indian Academy of Sciences as well as The World Academy of Sciences. The Council of Scientific ...
Go to Profile#6678
David Schachter
#150954
Overall Influence
#6679
Etana Padan
#151000
Overall Influence
1937 - Present (89 years)
#6680
Andrey B. Matsko
#151010
Overall Influence
#6681
Swapan Kumar Pati
#42103
Overall Influence
1968 - Present (58 years)
Swapan Kumar Pati is an Indian quantum chemist, a professor of the department of chemistry at the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research and the head of the Quantum Theory Molecules to Materials Group at the institute. He is known for his studies on electronic optical and magnetic phenomena in molecular systems and is an elected fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Sciences, India and The World Academy of Sciences. The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, the apex agency of the Government of India for scientific research, awarded him the Sh...
Go to Profile#6682
Kazuo Makishima
#151034
Overall Influence
#6683
Mitsumasa Iwamoto
#151049
Overall Influence
#6684
Péter Érdi
#33757
Overall Influence
1946 - Present (80 years)
Péter Érdi is a Hungarian born computational neuroscientist who now lives in Michigan, United States where he is a Henry R. Luce Professor at Kalamazoo College. In his career he wrote several books and published many scholarly articles in the fields of Chemical kinetics, Computational neuroscience and Complex systems
Go to Profile#6685
Christopher Chantler
#52402
Overall Influence
Professor Christopher T. Chantler is an Australian physicist, currently at University of Melbourne and an Elected Fellow of the American Physical Society who has had works published in the Journal of Physical and Chemical Reference Data, the Journal of Organometallic Chemistry and the X-Ray Spectrometry.
Go to Profile#6686
Karel van der Hucht
#136338
Overall Influence
1946 - Present (80 years)
Karel van der Hucht is a Dutch astronomer. Career Van der Hucht, son of teacher Jan van der Hucht and Jannigje Verhoek , studied and obtained his PhD at Utrecht University, and held a postdoc position at the Joint Institute for Laboratory Astrophysics in Boulder, Colorado, USA . From 1972 he was employed by the Utrecht Laboratory for Space Research, at the time under the Committee for Geophysics and Space Research of the KNAW, from 1983 called Stichting Ruimte Onderzoek Nederland as a senior scientist. In 1981 he compiled the first modern catalog of galactic Wolf–Rayet stars. In addition ...
Go to Profile#6687
Stephanie Wehner
#70423
Overall Influence
1977 - Present (49 years)
Stephanie Dorothea Christine Wehner is a German physicist and computer scientist. She is the Roadmap Leader of the Quantum Internet and Networked Computing initiative at QuTech, Delft University of Technology. She is also known for introducing the noisy-storage model in quantum cryptography. Wehner's research focuses mainly on quantum cryptography and quantum communications.
Go to Profile#6688
Robert J. Strangeway
#151100
Overall Influence
#6689
Mark E. Saffman
#151126
Overall Influence
#6690
Harvey Scher
#151141
Overall Influence
#6691
Rice
#151146
Overall Influence
#6692
Anne Juel
#108307
Overall Influence
Anne Juel is a physicist and academic who is currently Professor of Fluid Dynamics in the School of Physics & Astronomy at the University of Manchester. Juel is known for her research on fluid mechanics, the dynamics of surfaces in fluids, instability in fluid dynamics, viscous fingering, and convection. She has also studied the way ribbons curl when a scissor blade is run along them. At the University of Manchester, she directs the Manchester Centre for Nonlinear Dynamics.
Go to Profile#6693
Edward Eugene Fenimore
#151211
Overall Influence
#6694
Vadapalli Chandrasekhar
#151220
Overall Influence
#6695
Paola Cappellaro
#89047
Overall Influence
Paola Cappellaro is an Italian-American engineer who is a Professor of Nuclear Science and Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her research considers electron-spin resonance, nuclear magnetic resonance and quantum information processing. She leads the MIT Quantum Engineering Group at the Center for Ultracold Atoms.
Go to Profile#6696
Ted Janssen
#121112
Overall Influence
1936 - 2017 (81 years)
Theo Willem Jan Marie Janssen , better known as Ted Janssen, was a Dutch physicist and Full Professor of Theoretical Physics at the Radboud University Nijmegen. Together with Pim de Wolff and Aloysio Janner, he was one of the founding fathers of N-dimensional superspace approach in crystal structure analysis for the description of quasi periodic crystals and modulated structures. For this work he received the Aminoff Prize of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in 1988 and the Ewald Prize of the International Union of Crystallography in 2014. These achievements were merit of his unique talent, combining a deep knowledge of physics with a rigorous mathematical approach.
Go to Profile#6697
John Boardman
#65927
Overall Influence
1932 - Present (94 years)
Jack Melton Boardman, commonly known as John Boardman, is an American physicist. He is a former professor of physics at Brooklyn College; a noted science fiction fan, author and fanzine publisher; and a gaming authority.
Go to Profile#6698
Ganesh Prasad Srivastava
#110619
Overall Influence
1933 - 2011 (78 years)
Dr. Ganesh Prasad Srivastava, was an Indian professor of physics and author of several books. He was born in 1933. After a distinguished academic career of more than fifty years, he retired as Professor of Electronics from the Delhi University, where he taught Microwave Electronics for more than thirty-five years.
Go to Profile#6699
Karl‐heinz Rieder
#151269
Overall Influence
#6700
Gary D. Doolen
#151274
Overall Influence
