Search People Result | Academic Influence

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).

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List of the most influential people in Physics,

#3351

Boris Kadomtsev

Boris Kadomtsev

#82572

Overall Influence

1928 - 1998 (70 years)

Boris Borisovich Kadomtsev was a Soviet and Russian plasma physicist who worked on controlled fusion problems . He developed a theory of transport phenomena in turbulent plasmas and a theory of the so-called anomalous behavior of plasmas in magnetic fields. In 1966, he discovered plasma instability with trapped particles.

#3352

Mark T. Vande Hei

Mark T. Vande Hei

#24739

Overall Influence

1966 - Present (58 years)

Mark Thomas Vande Hei is a retired United States Army officer and current NASA astronaut who has served as a flight Engineer for Expedition 53, 54, 64, 65, and 66 on the International Space Station.

#3353

Jörg Kärger

#86130

Overall Influence

1943 - Present (81 years)

Jörg Kärger is a German physicist. Life and work Jörg Kärger was born in Erfurt. After attending school in Erfurt and Leipzig, he studied physics at the University of Leipzig, whose member he remained in the subsequent years, interrupted by guest stays in Prague, Leningrad, Moscow, Paris and Fredericton/Canada. His doctorate in 1970 with the dissertation "The diffusion of water at 13X zeolites: investigated by the method of nuclear magnetic resonance with the aid of pulsed field gradients" under the supervision of Harry Pfeifer was followed in 1978 by his doctorate B as well as the appointme...

#3354

Gerhard Dickel

#49768

Overall Influence

1913 - 2017 (104 years)

Gerhard Dickel was a German chemist and physicist. He developed a thermal diffusion method of separating isotopes with Klaus Clusius in 1938, sometimes referred to as Clusius-Dickel separation. Biography He was born in Augsburg. He studied under Clusius at the Institute for Physical Chemistry of the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. Clusius and Dickel published a paper in 1938 announcing that they had separated isotopes of neon. They had discovered that the normally inefficient thermal diffusion method – where isotopes in a fluid diffuse towards opposing hotter and colder regions – cou...

#3355

Pan Jianwei

#85411

Overall Influence

1970 - Present (54 years)

Pan Jianwei is a Chinese academic administrator and quantum physicist. He is a university administrator and professor of physics at the University of Science and Technology of China. Pan is known for his work in the field of quantum entanglement, quantum information and quantum computers. In 2017, he was named one of Nature's 10, which labelled him "Father of Quantum". He is an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the World Academy of Sciences and Executive Vice President of the University of Science and Technology of China. He also serves as one of the Vice Chairman of Jiusan S...

#3356

Joanna Haigh

#40544

Overall Influence

1954 - Present (70 years)

Joanna Dorothy Haigh is a British physicist and academic. Before her retirement in 2019 she was Professor of Atmospheric Physics at Imperial College London, and co-director of the Grantham Institute – Climate Change and Environment. She served as head of the department of physics at Imperial College London. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society , and a served as president of the Royal Meteorological Society.

#3357

Gary Steigman

#98058

Overall Influence

1941 - 2017 (76 years)

Gary Steigman was an American astrophysicist and astronomer, known for his research on primordial nucleosynthesis, particle physics in the first few minutes of the Big Bang, and relic particle abundance.

#3358

Peter H. Schultz

#82291

Overall Influence

1944 - Present (80 years)

Peter H. Schultz is Professor of Geological Sciences at Brown University specializing in the study of planetary geology, impact cratering on the Earth and other objects in the Solar System, and volcanic modifications of planetary surfaces. He was co-investigator to the NASA Science Mission Directorate spacecraft Deep Impact and the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite . He was awarded the Barringer Medal of the Meteoritical Society in 2004 for his theoretical and experimental studies of impact craters.

#3359

Che Ting Chan

#99013

Overall Influence

#3360

J. Ward Moody

#84283

Overall Influence

1954 - Present (70 years)

J. Ward Moody is a professor of astronomy at Brigham Young University . He received a Ph.D. in astronomy from The University of Michigan studying under Robert P. Kirshner. He did post-doctoral research at The Institute for Astronomy at the University of New Mexico with Stephen Gregory and Jack Burns, working on questions of large-scale galaxy structure. His dissertation and post-doctoral work established the existence of small, dwarf galaxies with emission-lines on the edges of galaxy supercluster voids.

#3361

Zachary Fisk

#99030

Overall Influence

1941 - Present (83 years)

#3362

Vladimir Baryshevsky

Vladimir Baryshevsky

#96529

Overall Influence

1940 - Present (84 years)

Vladimir Grigoryevich Baryshevsky is a Soviet and Belarusian physicist, Honored Scientist of the Republic of Belarus, Winner of the State Prize of the Republic of Belarus. He is the founder and the leader of the scientific school "Nuclear optics of polarized media."

#3363

John M. Martinis

#45152

Overall Influence

1958 - Present (66 years)

John M. Martinis is an American physicist and a professor of physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara. In 2014, the Google Quantum A.I. Lab announced that it had hired Martinis and his team in a multimillion dollar deal to build a quantum computer using superconducting qubits.

#3364

Michael Sterling

#12144

Overall Influence

1946 - Present (78 years)

Sir Michael John Howard Sterling is a British professor, and a former Vice-Chancellor of the Brunel University and the University of Birmingham . Early life In 1964, Sterling joined Associated Electrical Industries as a student apprentice. He was awarded a scholarship to the University of Sheffield to read electronic and electrical engineering. He graduated with a 1st class honours degree and subsequently a PhD degree in computer control in 1971.

#3365

William Andrew Bonner

#99114

Overall Influence

#3366

Phil Christensen

Phil Christensen

#50224

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (71 years)

Philip Russel Christensen is a geologist whose research interests focus on the composition, physical properties, processes, and morphology of planetary surfaces, with an emphasis on Mars and the Earth. He is currently a Regents' Professor and the Ed and Helen Korrick Professor of Geological Sciences at Arizona State University .

#3367

Akira Ishihama

#99157

Overall Influence

#3368

Willis Adcock

#10152

Overall Influence

1922 - 2003 (81 years)

Dr. Willis Alfred Adcock was a Canadian-American physical chemist, electrical engineer, and university professor who worked on the first atomic bomb and assisted with the invention of the silicon transistor, as well as the integrated circuit. He held several US patents.

#3369

Herman Branover

#24574

Overall Influence

1931 - Present (93 years)

Herman Branover is a Russian Israeli physicist and Jewish educator. He is best known in the Jewish world as an author, translator, publisher, and educator. Branover is known in the scientific community as a pioneer in the field of magnetohydrodynamics . In his personal conduct he adheres to the customs and mystical philosophy of Chabad Hasidism.

#3370

David Snoke

#42544

Overall Influence

1961 - Present (63 years)

David W. Snoke is a physics professor at the University of Pittsburgh in the Department of Physics and Astronomy. In 2006 he was elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society "for his pioneering work on the experimental and theoretical understanding of dynamical optical processes in semiconductor systems." In 2004 he co-wrote a controversial paper with prominent intelligent design proponent Michael Behe. In 2007, his research group was the first to report Bose-Einstein condensation of polaritons in a trap. David Snoke and theoretical physicist Jonathan Keeling recently published an article...

#3371

Igor Tamm

#99260

Overall Influence

#3372

Stefano Longhi

#99265

Overall Influence

#3373

Richard A. Betts

#42863

Overall Influence

Richard Arthur Betts is Head of the Climate Impacts strategic area at the Met Office Hadley Centre in Exeter, United Kingdom. He is also chair in Climate Impacts at the University of Exeter and the Principal Investigator of the EU FP7 project HELIX . He was a lead author for Working Group I and a contributing author for Working Group II of the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report. He was a lead author for Working Group II of the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report. He is an editor for the International Journal of Global Warming, the Journal of Environmental Investing, and for Earth System Dynamics. He ...

#3374

Radek Zbořil

#99296

Overall Influence

1973 - Present (51 years)

#3375

Erica Carlson

#91013

Overall Influence

Erica W. Carlson is an American physicist specializing in superconductors, liquid crystals, and strongly correlated materials. She is 150th Anniversary Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Purdue University. As well as for her research, she is known for her work in physics education for quantum physics, and for her introduction of innovative technologies including podcasts and wikis into her physics teaching.

#3376

Eric G. Blackman

#84324

Overall Influence

1968 - Present (56 years)

Eric Glen Blackman is an American astrophysicist and professor. Education and career Blackman graduated from the Harley School, and then obtained undergraduate degrees in physics and mathematics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He worked at the General Electric Research Laboratory during undergraduate summers. He subsequently completed a Master of Advanced Study in mathematics at Cambridge University, residing at Trinity College, Cambridge, followed by a Phd at Harvard University working in theoretical astrophysics with George B. Field. He was a postdoctoral fellow at ...

#3377

Ramón E. López

#76423

Overall Influence

1959 - Present (65 years)

Ramón E. López is a Puerto Rican physics professor at the University of Texas at Arlington whose research focuses on space physics and science education. He is an elected fellow of the American Physical Society and the recipient of its 2002 Dwight Nicholson Medal for Outreach for his contributions to science education. He is also an elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science .

#3378

Marie Machacek

#94211

Overall Influence

Marie E. Machacek is an astrophysicist conducting research in the High Energy Astrophysics Division of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. She earned a BA in physics and mathematics from Coe College, in 1969; an MS in physics from the University of Michigan, in 1970; and a PhD in physics from the University of Iowa, in 1973. Her current research explores interacting galaxies and the evolution of galaxies in galaxy groups and clusters. She is also the current coordinator for the SAO Astronomy Intern Program.

#3379

Christopher Dainty

#56635

Overall Influence

1947 - Present (77 years)

Christopher Dainty is a professor who researches optical imaging, scattering and propagation. In these areas he has published books: Scattering in Volumes and Surfaces , Laser Speckle and Related Phenomena and Image Science which he co-authored with Rodney Shaw. He has co-authored around 170 peer-reviewed papers and some 300 conference presentations.

#3380

Vladimir Petviashvili

Vladimir Petviashvili

#95562

Overall Influence

1936 - 1993 (57 years)

Vladimir Iosifovich Petviashvili was a Soviet physicist from Georgia. Petviashvili graduated from Tbilisi State University in 1959, where he also completed his doctoral studies. In 1963–1965, he was research assistant at the Institute of Physics of the Andronikashvili Academy of Sciences of the Georgian SSR. Since 1965 he worked at the Kurchatov Institute and at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology. In 1992, Petviashvili received the I. Tamm Prize for a series of works on Turbulence and eddy current structures in plasma.

#3381

Irfan Siddiqi

#41365

Overall Influence

Irfan Siddiqi is an American physicist and currently a professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley and a faculty scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory . He currently is the director of the Quantum Nanoelectronics Laboratory at UC Berkeley and the Advanced Quantum Testbed at LBNL. Siddiqi is known for groundbreaking contributions to the field of superconducting quantum circuits, including dispersive single-shot readout of superconducting quantum bits, quantum feedback, observation of single quantum trajectories, and near-quantum limited microwave frequency amplification.

#3382

Yuri G. Zdesenko

Yuri G. Zdesenko

#84681

Overall Influence

1943 - 2004 (61 years)

Yuri G. Zdesenko ; 6 October 1943 – 1 September 2004, was a Ukrainian nuclear physicist known for a significant contribution to investigations of double beta decay. Early life Yuri G. Zdesenko was born on 6 October 1943 in Dmytrivka, Bakhmach Raion, Chernihiv Oblast, Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic of the Soviet Union to Soviet Army officer Georgy Zdesenko.

#3383

Soo-Bong Kim

#91354

Overall Influence

1960 - Present (64 years)

Soo-Bong Kim is a South Korean physicist. Education Kim was born and raised in Busan, South Korea. He attended Dongrae High School, graduating in the class of 1979. Kim then graduated in 1983 and obtained his MS degree from Seoul National University. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1989. Kim's Ph.D. thesis was supervised by Alfred K. Mann and resulted in real-time and directional measurement of solar neutrinos in the Kamiokande-II detector and search for short-time variation.

#3384

Eberhard Grün

#88413

Overall Influence

1942 - Present (82 years)

Eberhard Grün is a German planetary scientist who specialized in cosmic dust research. He is an active emeritus at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics , Heidelberg , research associate at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics in Boulder , and was a professor at the University of Heidelberg until his retirement in 2007. Eberhard Grün has had a leading role in international cosmic dust science for over 40 years.

#3385

Edward J. Lofgren

#47759

Overall Influence

1914 - 2016 (102 years)

Edward Joseph Lofgren was an American physicist in the early days of nuclear physics and elementary particle research at the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory . He was born in Chicago. He was an important figure in the breakthroughs that followed the creation of the Bevatron, of which he was the director for a time.

#3386

Elbio Dagotto

#98425

Overall Influence

1959 - Present (65 years)

Elbio Rubén Dagotto is an Argentinian-American theoretical physicist and academic. He is a distinguished professor in the department of physics and astronomy at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and Distinguished Scientist in the Materials Science and Technology Division at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

#3387

Zbyszek Otwinowski

#99439

Overall Influence

1956 - Present (68 years)

#3388

Keith B. Oldham

#99442

Overall Influence

1929 - Present (95 years)

#3389

George Karreman

#48593

Overall Influence

1921 - 1997 (76 years)

George Karreman was a Dutch-born US physicist, mathematical biophysicist and mathematical/theoretical biologist. He was the first president of the Society for Mathematical Biology . Biography Karreman's father was Chief Engineer for the Dutch Merchant Marine. George Karreman studied physics and mathematics at Leiden University. In August 1948 Karreman emigrated to Chicago, USA, where he contacted Nicolas Rashevsky at the University of Chicago. He became one of Rashevsky' s best PhD students in Mathematical Biophysics. In 1950 Karreman underwent experimental heart surgery for an aortic coarctation at the University of Chicago.

#3390

Jozef T. Devreese

#85418

Overall Influence

1937 - Present (87 years)

Jozef T. Devreese was a Belgian scientist, with a long career in condensed matter physics. He was professor emeritus of theoretical physics at the University of Antwerp. He died on November 1, 2023. Academic career Devreese graduated in 1960 from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven where he received his PhD in science, group physics in 1964. From 1961 till 1966 he worked at the Solid State Physics Department of the Research Centre for Nuclear Energy in Mol . In 1966 he started his work as lecturer and then full professor at the University of Antwerp, where he founded the research group TFVS ....

#3391

Stuart Crampin

#99542

Overall Influence

#3392

Gerrit E. W. Bauer

#99282

Overall Influence

Gerrit E. W. Bauer is a physicist and Professor and Principal Investigator at Tohoku University. He is one of the top highly-cited researchers according to webometrics.

#3393

John Enderby

#57393

Overall Influence

1931 - 2021 (90 years)

Sir John Edwin Enderby was a British physicist, and was Professor of Physics at University of Bristol from 1976 to 1996. He developed innovative ways of using neutrons to study matter at the microscopic level. His research has particularly advanced our understanding of the structure of multicomponent liquids— those made up of two or more types of atoms – including commonly used liquid alloys and glasses.

#3394

Francesco Mainardi

#80032

Overall Influence

1942 - Present (82 years)

Francesco Mainardi is an Italian physicist and mathematician. Early life Mainardi was born in Lugo, Italy, on December 29, 1942. He graduated from the University of Bologna in 1966 with a degree in theoretical physics.

#3395

Leo Stodolsky

#95898

Overall Influence

1937 - Present (87 years)

Leo Stodolsky is the former director of the Max Planck Institute for Physics.

#3396

Bengt Westerlund

#99641

Overall Influence

1921 - 2008 (87 years)

Bengt Westerlund was a Swedish astronomer who specialised in observational astronomy. He received his PhD from Uppsala University in 1954. In 1957 he was appointed astronomer at the Uppsala Southern Station at Mount Stromlo Observatory in Australia, where he made extensive studies of the southern Milky Way and the Magellanic Clouds. In 1967 he took a position as astronomer at Steward Observatory in Arizona and in 1969 was appointed Director of ESO in Chile, a position he held until 1975, when he returned to Sweden to become Professor of Astronomy at Uppsala Astronomical Observatory, retiring ...

#3397

Paweł Horodecki

#44057

Overall Influence

1971 - Present (53 years)

Paweł Horodecki is a Polish professor of physics at the Gdańsk University of Technology working in the field of quantum information theory. He is best known for introducing the Peres-Horodecki criterion for testing whether a quantum state is entangled. Moreover, Paweł Horodecki demonstrated that there exist states which are entangled whereas no pure entangled states can be obtained from them by means of local operations and classical communication . Such states are called bound entangled states. He also showed that even bound entanglement can lead to quantum teleportation with a fidelity im...

#3398

Cho Gyeong-chul

#93392

Overall Influence

1929 - 2010 (81 years)

Cho Gyeong-chul was a South Korean astronomer who worked at NASA and the US Naval Observatory. Biography He was born in Sonchon, Pyongannam-do. He finished his middle and high school courses at Pyongyang and was then admitted to Yonhui University. During the Korean War he served in the South Korean army, and in 1952 he was a professor at the South Korean military academy. In 1954 he graduated in physics from Yonhui University.

#3399

Hirotaka Sugawara

Hirotaka Sugawara

#82583

Overall Influence

1938 - Present (86 years)

is a Japanese physicist, specializing in the theoretical study of particle physics. He is known for the "Lee-Sugawara relation" and "A Field Theory of Currents" aka "Sugawara Construction" of the energy-momentum tensor.

#3400

Ben Gascoigne

#75928

Overall Influence

1915 - 2010 (95 years)

Sidney Charles Bartholemew "Ben" Gascoigne was a New Zealand-born optical astronomer and expert in photometry who played a leading role in the design and commissioning of Australia's largest optical telescope, the Anglo-Australian Telescope, which for a time was one of the world's most important astronomical facilities. Born in Napier, New Zealand, Gascoigne trained in Auckland and at the University of Bristol, before moving to Australia during World War II to work at the Commonwealth Solar Observatory at Mount Stromlo in Canberra. He became skillful in the design and manufacture of optical ...

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