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
#3101
Keith R. Matthews
#160097
Overall Influence
#3102
Ernst Niebur
#160115
Overall Influence
#3103
Richard L. Proia
#160155
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (25 years)
#3104
Andr ´ E. Dehon
#160162
Overall Influence
#3105
Charles E. Schwartz
#160272
Overall Influence
#3106
Andrew Pomiankowski
#160358
Overall Influence
#3107
Narsingh Deo
#160388
Overall Influence
#3108
Yi Zhang
#160420
Overall Influence
Yi Zhang is a Chinese-American biochemist who specializes in the fields of epigenetics, chromatin, and developmental reprogramming. He is a Fred Rosen Professor of Pediatrics and professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School, a senior investigator of Program in Cellular and Molecular Medicine at Boston Children's Hospital, and an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. He is also an associate member of the Harvard Stem Cell Institute, as well as the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. He is best known for his discovery of several classes of epigenetic enzymes and the identifica...
Go to Profile#3109
Dale Ian Pullin
#160530
Overall Influence
#3110
Michael J. Marks
#160562
Overall Influence
#3111
Venkatraman Gopalan
#160658
Overall Influence
#3112
Francesco Ciucci
#160674
Overall Influence
#3113
Philippe Coussot
#160690
Overall Influence
#3114
Enric Canadell
#160822
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (75 years)
#3115
Edward J. Feil
#160902
Overall Influence
#3116
Patricia Quinn
#161032
Overall Influence
Patricia K. Quinn is a atmospheric chemist working at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency's Pacific Marine Environmental Lab. She is known for her work on the impact of atmospheric aerosol particles on air quality and climate.
Go to Profile#3117
Billie Kenneth Koe
#161048
Overall Influence
#3118
Andreas G. Andreou
#161105
Overall Influence
#3119
Paul A. Rota
#161222
Overall Influence
#3120
Vicki H. Wysocki
#161262
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (25 years)
#3121
William Jacob Knox Jr.
#161322
Overall Influence
1904 - 1995 (91 years)
William Jacob Knox Jr. was an American chemist at Columbia University in New York City and one of the African American scientists and technicians on the Manhattan Project. Knox held an unprecedented position, serving as the only African American supervisor for the Manhattan Project. Knox is credited for nuclear research of gaseous diffusion techniques used for the separation of uranium isotopes. Knox's efforts in the development of uranium contributed to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945.
Go to Profile#3122
Tammy Ma
#161330
Overall Influence
Tammy Ma is an American plasma physicist who works on inertial confinement fusion at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Education and career Ma studied aerospace engineering at the California Institute of Technology, graduating in 2005. She went to the University of California, San Diego for graduate study, earning a master's degree in 2008 and completing her Ph.D. in 2010.
Go to Profile#3123
Pavel Kaskarov
#161488
Overall Influence
1947 - Present (78 years)
Pavel Kaskarov — was a Soviet and Russian physicist. Doctor of physical and mathematical Sciences, honored Professor of Moscow state University. Head of the Department of General physics for the faculty of chemistry/General physics and molecular electronics
Go to Profile#3124
Mathieu Desbrun
#161557
Overall Influence
#3125
Lorella Jones
#161577
Overall Influence
1943 - 1995 (52 years)
Lorella Margaret Jones , was a professor of physics and director of the Computer-based Education Research Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. Jones was interested in the application of computers to physics education and championed the cause of women in physics. She wrote an essay entitled "Intellectual Contributions of Women in Physics" in Women of Science: Righting the Record.
Go to Profile#3126
Egill Hauksson
#161579
Overall Influence
#3127
Vasiliki Pavlidou
#161917
Overall Influence
Vasiliki Pavlidou is a Greek astrophysicst and Full Professor in the Department of Physics at the University of Crete and an Affiliated Faculty at the Institute of Astrophysics - Foundation for Research & Technology - Helas. Since July 2023 she serves as an associate editor in the peer-reviewed scientific journal Astronomy & Astrophysics Her research interests focus on cosmology, high energy physics and radio astronomy.
Go to Profile#3128
Alexander Hoffmann
#161936
Overall Influence
#3129
Michael L. Seibert
#161948
Overall Influence
#3130
Scott E. Hensley
#161975
Overall Influence
#3131
Robert W. Carlson
#161982
Overall Influence
#3132
Norman W. Murray
#161987
Overall Influence
#3133
Frank A. Podosek
#162043
Overall Influence
#3134
Andrew Blitzer
#162058
Overall Influence
#3135
Richard T. Wyatt
#162130
Overall Influence
#3136
Martin Kunz
#162246
Overall Influence
1970 - Present (55 years)
#3137
Alain Omont
#162258
Overall Influence
#3138
Richard C. Willson
#162274
Overall Influence
#3139
Michael H. Briggs
#162378
Overall Influence
#3140
Louis Giglio
#162402
Overall Influence
#3141
Antonis Papachristodoulou
#162449
Overall Influence
#3142
Frederick K. Lamb
#162500
Overall Influence
1945 - Present (80 years)
#3143
Nicole Bell
#162650
Overall Influence
1976 - Present (49 years)
Nicole F. Bell is an Australian physicist who is a professor at the University of Melbourne. She is a theoretical physicist who works on dark matter, neutrino physics, and other topics in particle and astroparticle theory
Go to Profile#3144
Alan James Barr
#162737
Overall Influence
#3145
Alice White
#162774
Overall Influence
Alice Elizabeth White is an American physicist. She is a professor and chair at the Boston University College of Engineering. Previously, she was Chief Scientist at Bell Labs. She is a fellow of the APS, the IEEE and the OSA.
Go to Profile#3146
Malgorzata Marek-Sadowska
#162964
Overall Influence
Malgorzata Marek-Sadowska is a Polish-American electronics engineer known for her research in VLSI circuit design. She is a professor emeritus of electrical and computer engineering at the University of California, Santa Barbara, a member of the university's Institute for Energy Efficiency, and the director of the VLSI CAD Lab at the university.
Go to Profile#3147
Ronald Seifer
#163002
Overall Influence
#3148
Robert Lee Metzenberg
#163122
Overall Influence
#3149
Dominique Weis
#163150
Overall Influence
#3150
Vivek A. Kumar
#163216
Overall Influence
1984 - Present (41 years)
Vivek A. Kumar is an American scientist, innovator and entrepreneur. He is faculty at the New Jersey Institute of Technology and the Rutgers School of Dental Medicine; he was also previously the Dhiraj Shah Faculty Fellow at the NJIT Albert Dorman Honors College. At NJIT, he is the director of the KumarLab for Biomaterial Drug Discovery, Delivery, and Development Lab.
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