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.
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List of the most influential people in Physics,
#10951
James Couper
1752 - 1836 (84 years)
James Couper was a Scottish astronomer. He was Professor of Astronomy at the University of Glasgow from 1803 to 1836. Life Couper was a Professor of Astronomy at the University of Glasgow from 1803 to 1836. He also held other positions within the university including:Dean of Faculties 1800–1801Clerk of Senate from 1810 to 1814, 1820 to 1828keeper of the Hunterian Museum He taught very little Astronomy and abandoned observations because of the increasing smoke and new buildings in the surrounding areas of the observatory. He seemed not to have considered building a new observatory outside th...
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Frank Perkins Whitman
1853 - 1919 (66 years)
Frank Perkins Whitman , was an American physicist Biography Whitman was born in Troy, New York on July 29, 1853. He was graduated at Brown University in 1874 and took his A.M. there in 1877, later studying at Johns Hopkins University. He was professor of physics at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, in 1880–1886, and from 1886 occupied the same position at the Western Reserve University. He was a contributor to scientific periodicals.
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Victor Mercea
1924 - 1987 (63 years)
Victor Mercea was a Romanian nuclear physicist. His most notable scientific contributions were to the production of heavy water. He authored more than 200 scientific publications. He was the head of the Institute of Isotopic and Molecular Technologies from 1970 to 1987; Professor of Solid-State Physics, Magnetism and Electronics at Babeș-Bolyai University; Dean of the Faculty of Physics ; corresponding member of the Romanian Academy .
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Reinhard Mecke
1895 - 1969 (74 years)
Reinhard Mecke was a German physicist, who focused on chemical physics. He was one of the pioneers of infrared spectroscopy. Reinhard Mecke studied from 1913 mathematics and physics at the universities of Freiburg, Bern and Marburg and did his doctorate at Franz Richarz in Marburg in 1920 on halos in homogeneous nebulas. He then worked for Heinrich Konen at the university of Bonn, where he habilitated in 1923 on spectral bands of jod and where he became a privatdozent. 1927 he married one of his PhD students M. Guillery and had with her nine children including Dieter Mecke.
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Albert Curtz
1600 - 1671 (71 years)
Albert Curtz , was a German astronomer and member of the Society of Jesus. He expanded on the works of Tycho Brahe and used the pseudonym of Lucius Barrettus. Background The Latin version of the name Albert Curtz, Albertus Curtius is an anagram of his pseudonym, Lucius Barretus.
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Ernest Howard Griffiths
1851 - 1932 (81 years)
Ernest Howard Griffiths was a British physicist born in Brecon, Wales. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1895 and won its Hughes Medal in 1907. On his maternal side he was a descendant of the 17th-century admiral Robert Blake.
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Franz Anton von Gerstner
1796 - 1840 (44 years)
Franz Anton Ritter von Gerstner was a German-Bohemian civil engineer, professor and railway pioneer. Career The son of physicist and railway pioneer Franz Josef Gerstner, Franz Anton von Gerstner studied engineering, philosophy, technology and mechanical engineering at the Polytechnic in Prague. From 1817 he taught practical geometry and land surveying as a professor at the Vienna Polytechnic Institute.
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Dror Sarid
#10959
Pavel Parenago
1906 - 1960 (54 years)
Pavel Petrovich Parenago was a Soviet scientist, astronomer, and professor. He served as the head of the Department of Stellar Astronomy at M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University and a Corresponding Member of the Soviet Academy of Sciences.
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Robert Emerson
1903 - 1959 (56 years)
Robert Emerson was an American scientist noted for his discovery that plants have two distinct photosynthetic reaction centress. Family Emerson was born in 1903 in New York City, the son of Dr. Haven Emerson, Health Commissioner of New York City, and Grace Parrish Emerson, the sister of Maxfield Parrish. Emerson was the brother of John Haven Emerson the inventor of the iron lung.
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Charles S. Howe
1858 - 1939 (81 years)
Charles Sumner Howe was the second president of Case School of Applied Science, now Case Western Reserve University. Howe was born on September 29, 1858, in Nashua, New Hampshire. He earned his B.S. at both Massachusetts Agricultural College and Boston University in 1878 and his PhD from the College of Wooster in 1887.
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Christian Ludwig Ideler
1766 - 1846 (80 years)
Christian Ludwig Ideler was a German chronologist and astronomer. Life He was born in Gross-Brese near Perleberg. His earliest work was the editing in 1794 of an astronomical almanac for the Prussian government. He taught mathematics and mechanics in the school of woods and forests, and also in the military school. In 1821, he became professor at the University of Berlin, and in 1829 became a foreign member of the Institute of France. From 1816 to 1822 he was tutor to the young princes William Frederick and Charles. He died in Berlin on 10 August 1846.
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Karl Friedrich Küstner
1856 - 1936 (80 years)
Karl Friedrich Küstner was a German astronomer who also made contributions to Geodesy. In 1888 he reportedly discovered the Polar motion of the Earth. In 1910 he received the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society for cataloguing stars and detecting latitude variation.
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Salomon Kalischer
1845 - 1924 (79 years)
Salomon Kalischer, or Solomon Kalischer , was a German Jewish composer, pianist, and physicist. Kalischer was born in Thorn in the Province of Prussia, within the Kingdom of Prussia. He studied at the Jewish Theological Seminary of Breslau and the universities of Breslau and Berlin .
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Bartholomaeus Pitiscus
1561 - 1613 (52 years)
Bartholomaeus Pitiscus was a 16th-century German trigonometrist, astronomer and theologian who first coined the word trigonometry. Biography Pitiscus was born to poor parents in Grünberg , then part of the Duchy of Glogau/Głogów, one of the Habsburg-ruled Duchies of Silesia.
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Richard W. Jones
1904 - 1987 (83 years)
Richard Ward Jones was a biomedical engineer and authority on physiological control systems. Education His BS was from the University of Minnesota, 1926. His MS in physics was from Northwestern University, 1941, under Walter S. Huxford for a thesis entitled: Discharge Across Very Small Gaps.
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Georges Destriau
1903 - 1960 (57 years)
Georges Destriau was a French physicist and early observer of electroluminescence. Education and Research In 1926 Destriau became an engineer at the École Centrale des Arts et Manufactures in Paris. Thereafter he worked in the x-ray device industry. From 1932 until 1941 Destriau worked at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique. A brief stay at the University of Bordeaux was followed in 1943 by a move to Paris. In 1946 Destriau became professor at the University of Poitiers and in 1954 at the Sorbonne in Paris. Later Destriau worked for Westinghouse Electric.
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Arthur C. Hardy
1895 - 1977 (82 years)
Arthur Cobb Hardy was president of the Optical Society of America from 1935-36. He was awarded the Edward Longstreth Medal from the Franklin Institute in 1939 and the Frederic Ives Medal in 1957. See also Optical Society of America#Past Presidents of the OSA
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Peter Mason
1922 - 1987 (65 years)
Peter Mason was an English-born Australian physicist, educator and science communicator. He was born at St Pancras in London to chemist Alfred George Mason and Winnie, née Wheeldon. He attended Eriva Deene School, St Clement's Mixed School and Bournemouth School before attending the University of London , winning first-class honours in mathematics and physics. From 1943 to 1946 he was employed at the Ministry of Supply studying the military applications of quartz crystals, and in 1945 he became an associate member of the Institute of Physics. He married Sheila Mabelle Clegg at Bournemouth on ...
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Emil Bose
1874 - 1911 (37 years)
Emil Hermann Bose , was a German physicist. He was the first director of the Department of Electrical Engineering at the University of La Plata, Argentina. He studied under Walther Nernst at the University of Göttingen, Germany and was recruited by the newly created university in Argentina, where he taught for two years until his death from typhoid fever in 1911. He was succeeded by Richard Gans. See Bibiloni, A.G.
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Wayne B. Nottingham
1899 - 1964 (65 years)
Wayne B. Nottingham was a US physics professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology , specialized on electronics, field electron emission, thermionics, photoelectrics and low pressure equipment.
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Wolfgang Ludwig Krafft
1743 - 1814 (71 years)
Wolfgang Ludwig Krafft was a German astronomer and physicist. He is the namesake of the lunar crater Krafft which has a diameter of 51 km. External links USGS Astrogeology
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Arthur S. Adams
1896 - 1980 (84 years)
Arthur Stanton Adams was an American academic most notable for having served as the President of the University of New Hampshire. He also served as Assistant Dean of Engineering and Director of the Engineering Science Management War Training Program and Provost at Cornell. In 1948 he was appointed the 8th president of the University of New Hampshire. He was chairman of the Reserve Forces Policy Board at the United States Department of Defense from 1953 to 1955. From 1962 to 1965, he served as the second president of the Salzburg Global Seminar, a non-profit organization based in Salzburg, Aus...
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Nikolay Zhukovsky
1847 - 1921 (74 years)
Nikolay Yegorovich Zhukovsky was a Russian scientist, mathematician and engineer, and a founding father of modern aero- and hydrodynamics. Whereas contemporary scientists scoffed at the idea of human flight, Zhukovsky was the first to undertake the study of airflow. He is often called the Father of Russian Aviation.
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Valentin Naboth
1523 - 1593 (70 years)
Valentin Naboth , known by the latinized name Valentinus Nabodus, was a German mathematician, astronomer and astrologer. Life and academic career Valentin Naboth was born in Calau to a formerly Jewish family. He was the younger brother of the Lutheran theologian and author Alexius Naboth. In 1544, Valentin matriculated at the University of Wittenberg. At that time Philipp Melanchthon, Erasmus Reinhold, Johannes Bugenhagen, Paul Eber, and Georg Major taught there. In 1550 he transferred to the University of Erfurt.
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James Wilson
1836 - 1931 (95 years)
James Maurice Wilson was a British priest in the Church of England as well as a theologian, teacher and astronomer. Early life Wilson and his twin brother, Edward Pears Wilson, attended King William's College on the Isle of Man from August 1848 to midsummer 1853 . Their father Edward, vicar of Nocton in Lincolnshire, had earlier been headmaster there. According to his autobiography, Wilson had a rather unhappy time at King William's College. He later studied at Sedbergh School.
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Johann Jakob Ebert
1737 - 1805 (68 years)
Johann Jakob Ebert was an 18th-century German mathematician, astronomer, poet and author. Life He was born in Breslau in what was then part of Prussia on 20 November 1737. He was educated in Wurzen in western Saxony then returned to his home town to study at the Elisabeth Gymnasium.
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Nikolai Andreyev
1880 - 1970 (90 years)
Nikolai Nikolayevich Andreyev was a physicist who specialized in the study of music and acoustics. The Andreyev Acoustics Institute and a research vessel Akademik Nikolai Andreyev are named after him.
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Bice Sechi-Zorn
1928 - 1984 (56 years)
Bice Sechi-Zorn was an Italian/American nuclear physicist, and professor at the University of Maryland. Life She graduated from University of Cagliari. She met her husband, Gus T. Zorn, at the University of Padua. They both worked at the University of Maryland. She was a professor of physics beginning from 1976 to 1984.
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Willem Hendrik van den Bos
1896 - 1974 (78 years)
Willem Hendrik van den Bos was a Dutch astronomer who worked at the Union Observatory in South Africa and became its director in 1941. He discovered nearly new double stars, made more than astronomical measurements and compiled a catalogue of Southern hemisphere double stars. He computed the orbits of more than 100 double stars using a method he invented and which later became the accepted standard.
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Konstantin Kavelin
1818 - 1885 (67 years)
Konstantin Dmitrievich Kavelin was a Russian historian, jurist, and sociologist, sometimes called the chief architect of early Russian liberalism. Born in Saint Petersburg into an old noble family, Kavelin graduated from the legal department of the Moscow University and read law at the University of St Petersburg from 1839. Together with Timofey Granovsky and Alexander Herzen, he was one of the leading Westernizers. In 1855, Herzen published Kavelin's celebrated proposal for the emancipation of serfs, which cost him the lucrative position of tsesarevich's tutor. In 1862, he was forced to resign from his post for becoming politically-involved with the student, constitutional movement.
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Philippe van Lansberge
1561 - 1632 (71 years)
Johan Philip Lansberge was a Flemish Calvinist Minister, astronomer and Mathematician. His name is sometimes written Lansberg, and his first name is sometimes given as Philip or Johannes Philippus. He published under the Latin name Philippus Lansbergius.
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Giuseppe Cassella
1755 - 1808 (53 years)
Giuseppe, Antonio Pietro Cassella was an Italian astronomer, professor of Astronomy at the Naples University and first director of the Astronomical Observatory of Naples. He studied mathematics at the University of Naples with Giuseppe Marzucca, and followed Felice Sabatelli's astronomy lessons, becoming his student. He then went to specialize in astronomy at the Padua observatory directed by Abbot Giuseppe Toaldo.
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Paul Harsin
1902 - 1983 (81 years)
Paul Marie Isidore Harsin was an economic and political historian who held doctorates in the humanities, social sciences, and law. He was a professor at the University of Liège for over 40 years and briefly served as president of the Royal Academy of Science, Letters and Fine Arts of Belgium.
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Irving Wolff
1894 - 1982 (88 years)
Irving Wolff was an American physicist and pioneer of radar. Wolff received in 1916 a bachelor's degree in physics from Dartmouth College and in 1923 a doctorate in physics from Cornell University. He was a physics teacher at Iowa State College in 1919 and Cornell University from 1920-1923, later becoming the Heckscher Research Fellow. He is one of the founders of the Acoustical Society of America . He participated in ASA First Meeting along with thirty-nine other persons, at the Bell headquarters in New York City, on December 27th, 1928. Early in his career, he focused on the acoustics of...
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Earle M. Terry
1869 - 1929 (60 years)
Earle Melvin Terry was an American physicist, known for contributions to wireless transmission systems and radio. Biography He was born in Battle Creek, Michigan, and obtained a B.A. from the University of Michigan, as well as an M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin–Madison . He joined the faculty at the same place, where he stayed since. His fame comes from developing the WHA radio transmissions , work jointly with Edward Bennett. The station was originally referred to by the callsign 9XM. Being as the necessary vacuum tubes were not yet commercially available, Terry learned gla...
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Alexander David Ross
1883 - 1966 (83 years)
Prof Alexander David Ross FRSE FRAS FRSA FIP FAIP FEIS FEISA LLD was a 20th-century Scots-born physicist, mathematician and astronomer living in Australia. He was an expert on magnetism and rare earths. He was twice President of the Western Australia Astronomical Society: 1915 to 1917 and 1950 to 1952, 33 years apart.
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Laurentius Paulinus Gothus
1565 - 1646 (81 years)
Laurentius Paulinus Gothus was a Swedish theologian, astronomer and Archbishop of Uppsala. Biography Gothus was born Lars Paulsson at Söderköping in Östergötland County, Sweden. In 1588, Gothus travelled to Germany and studied in the Rostock University for three years. He was influenced by Pierre de la Ramée and his philosophy.
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Olaf Devik
1886 - 1987 (101 years)
Olaf Martin Devik was a Norwegian physicist and civil servant. He worked in academia until 1938, when he became an official in the Norwegian Ministry of Church and Education. During the German occupation of Norway, he fled the country and worked with its government in exile. After the war, he returned to the education ministry until his retirement.
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Thomas Hood
1556 - 1620 (64 years)
Thomas Hood was an English mathematician and physician, the first lecturer in mathematics appointed in England, a few years before the founding of Gresham College. He publicized the Copernican theory, and discussed the nova SN 1572. . He also innovated in the design of mathematical and astronomical instruments.
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Jan Šindel
1375 - 1456 (81 years)
Jan Šindel , also known as Jan Ondřejův , was a Czech medieval scientist and Catholic priest. He was a professor at Charles University in Prague and became the rector of the university in 1410. He lectured on mathematics and astronomy and was also a personal astrologer and physician of kings Wenceslaus IV of Bohemia and his brother Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund.
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Mary Acworth Evershed
1867 - 1949 (82 years)
Mary Acworth Evershed was a British astronomer and scholar. Her work on Dante Alighieri was written under the pen name M.A. Orr. Early life Mary Acworth Orr was born to Lucy Acworth and Andrew Orr on 1 January 1867 at Plymouth Hoe. Her father was an officer in the Royal Artillery. Mary grew up in Wimborne and South Stoke in Somerset. Mary’s youngest brother was the colonial administrator Charles William James Orr.
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Richard Krzymowski
1875 - 1960 (85 years)
Richard Krzymowski was a German agricultural scientist. His main research interests were agricultural geography and agricultural history. Krzymowski's main work is "History of German Agriculture" an exemplary textbook for an integrated presentation of agricultural history, agricultural geography, and the history of agricultural production techniques.
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William Morgan
1750 - 1833 (83 years)
William Morgan, FRS was a British physician, physicist and statistician, who is considered the father of modern actuarial science. He is also credited with being the first to record the "invisible light" produced when a current is passed through a partly evacuated glass tube: "the first x-ray tube".
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Morris B. Crawford
1852 - 1940 (88 years)
Morris Barker Crawford was an American academic, and the first professor of physics at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut. Early life and education He was born in 1852 in Sing Sing, now Ossining, New York to the Rev. Morris DeCamp Crawford and Charlotte Crawford. Both his father and his grandfather were ministers. He graduated from Wesleyan University in 1874, and he was a member of the Eclectic Society and of Phi Beta Kappa. He earned a Master of Arts degree from Wesleyan in 1877.
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Bohdan Stefanowski
1883 - 1976 (93 years)
Bohdan Stefanowski was a Polish expert in thermodynamics, one of founders of the Warsaw school of thermodynamics, the first rector of Lodz University of Technology. After graduation from the Mechanical Engineering Department of Lviv Polytechnic in 1904, Bohdan Stefanowski pursued a career in industry as a specialist in heat management and then spent several years furthering his education under the supervision of Prof. Mollier in Dresden and Prof. Joss at Königliche Technische Hochschule in Charlottenburg.
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Szczepan Szczeniowski
1898 - 1979 (81 years)
Professor Szczepan Eugeniusz Szczeniowski , was a Polish physicist, and author of numerous papers on cosmic rays, electron diffraction and ferromagnetism. In early 1930s, he taught at the Jan Kazimierz University in Lwow, in 1937 moving to the Stefan Batory University in Wilno. After World War II, he settled in Poznań, also cooperating with the Warsaw Polytechnic. Szczeniowski was a member of many prestigious organizations - Technical Science Academy, Polish Academy of Knowledge and Polish Academy of Sciences.
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Georg Joseph Sidler
1831 - 1907 (76 years)
Georg Joseph Sidler was a Swiss mathematician, professor at the university of Bern. Life and work Sidler was born on 31 August 1831 in Zug, Switzerland to Georg Joseph Sidler and Verena Maria Sidler . He was their only son. He also had two half-sisters from his father's first marriage. One of the girls died at the age of seven. Both of Georg's parents came from old-established families in Canton of Zug; Many of his ancestors had been involved in local and cantonal politics. His paternal grandfather, Georg Damian held a number of offices; most notably he served as a Landvogt in the Valle Maggia in Ticino.
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Andrzej Sołtan
1897 - 1959 (62 years)
Andrzej Sołtan was a Polish nuclear physicist. He also worked on spectroscopy in the band between far ultraviolet and X-rays. During his visit to Caltech in 1932–33, together with H. Richard Crane and Charles Christian Lauritsen, he discovered a method for producing neutron beams, by bombarding lithium or beryllium nuclei with accelerated deuterons.
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Konstanty Jodko-Narkiewicz
1901 - 1963 (62 years)
Konstanty Jodko-Narkiewicz, also known as Konstanty Narkiewicz-Jodko , was a Polish geophysicist who specialized in studying cosmic radiation. He was also a mountaineer, Arctic explorer, and balloonist.
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