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
#37301
Yuvan Shankar Raja
#37313
Overall Influence
1979 - Present (47 years)
Yuvan Shankar Raja is an Indian film score and soundtrack composer and singer-songwriter. He mainly scores music for Tamil films along with few Telugu, Kannada, and Hindi films. Considered a versatile composer, he is particularly known for his use of Western music elements and often credited with having introduced hip hop to the Tamil film and music industry and started the "era of remixes" in Tamil Nadu which included mixed EDM and jazz. He is frequently referred to as the "BGM King" and the "Young Maestro" of Tamil Film Music. Yuvan has won two Filmfare Awards South, five Mirchi Music Awar...
Go to Profile#37302
John Pelesko
#37314
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
John A. Pelesko is an American mathematician. He is provost and senior vice president for academic affairs at New Jersey Institute of Technology. Previously, he was Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Delaware and a Professor in the Department of Mathematical Sciences.
Go to Profile#37303
Liam Neeson
#37315
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (74 years)
William John Neeson is an actor from Northern Ireland. He has received several accolades, including nominations for an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, three Golden Globe Awards, and two Tony Awards. In 2020, he was placed seventh on The Irish Times list of Ireland's 50 Greatest Film Actors. Neeson was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 2000.
Go to Profile#37304
Malcolm D. Shuster
#37316
Overall Influence
1943 - 2012 (69 years)
Malcolm D. Shuster was an American physicist and aerospace engineer, whose work contributed significantly to spacecraft attitude determination. In 1977 he joined the Attitude Systems Operation of the Computer Sciences Corporation in Silver Spring, Maryland, during which time he developed the QUaternion ESTimator algorithm for static attitude determination. He later, with F. Landis Markley, helped to develop the standard implementation of the Kalman filter used in spacecraft attitude estimation. During his career, he authored roughly fifty technical papers on subjects in physics and spacecraf...
Go to Profile#37305
Shoaib Malik
#37317
Overall Influence
1982 - Present (44 years)
Shoaib Malik is a Pakistani cricketer who plays for the Pakistan national cricket team and currently plays for Karachi Kings in the Pakistan Super League . He was the captain of the Pakistan national cricket team from 2007 to 2009. He made his One-Day International debut in 1999 against the West Indies and his Test debut in 2001 against Bangladesh. On 3 November 2015, he announced his retirement from Test cricket to focus on 2019 Cricket World Cup. On 2 July 2018, he became the first male cricketer to play 100 T20Is. On 5 July 2019, he announced his retirement from One Day International crick...
Go to Profile#37306
Danny Sullivan
#37318
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Daniel John Sullivan III , better known as Danny Sullivan, is an American former racing driver. He earned 17 wins in the CART Indy Car World Series, including the 1985 Indianapolis 500. Sullivan won the 1988 CART Championship, and placed third in points in 1986. Sullivan also scored a victory in IROC. He competed in the 1983 Formula One season with Tyrrell, scoring 2 championship points.
Go to Profile#37307
Haim Beinart
#37319
Overall Influence
1917 - 2010 (93 years)
Haim Beinart was an Israeli historian and academic administrator. Originally from Russia, he was a professor of history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He served as the dean of humanities at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. He specialized in the history of Iberian Jews.
Go to Profile#37308
Richard Thomas
#37320
Overall Influence
1938 - Present (88 years)
John Paul Richard Thomas is an American taxonomist and systematist, and retired professor of herpetology and evolution at University of Puerto Rico-Rio Piedras . He described several species new to science, mostly amphibians and reptiles, from throughout the Caribbean islands including the common coquí , the national animal of Puerto Rico.
Go to Profile#37309
Alex Chadwick
#37321
Overall Influence
1901 - Present (125 years)
Alex Chadwick is an American journalist best known for his work on National Public Radio, and as a former co-host of the radio newsmagazine Day to Day. He was a part of the development of NPR's Morning Edition in the 1970s and was an on-air personality on All Things Considered and Weekend Edition. Chadwick has also worked with ABC and CBS.
Go to Profile#37310
Bill Pullman
#37322
Overall Influence
1953 - Present (73 years)
William Pullman is an American actor. After graduating with a Master of Fine Arts degree in theater, he was an adjunct professor at Montana State University before deciding to pursue acting. He made his film debut in Ruthless People , and starred in Spaceballs , The Accidental Tourist , Sleepless in Seattle , While You Were Sleeping , Casper , Independence Day , Lost Highway , and Lake Placid . He has appeared frequently on television, usually in TV films. Starting in the 2000s he has also acted in miniseries and regular series, such as Torchwood , starring roles in 1600 Penn and The Sinner .
Go to Profile#37311
H. Wiley Hitchcock
#37323
Overall Influence
1923 - 2007 (84 years)
Hugh Wiley Hitchcock was an American musicologist. He is best known for founding the Institute for Studies in American Music at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York in 1971. The institute was recently renamed the Hitchcock Institute for Studies in American Music in his honor.
Go to Profile#37312
Marius Romme
#37324
Overall Influence
1934 - Present (92 years)
Marius Anton Joannes Romme is a Dutch psychiatrist. He is best known for his work on hearing voices and regarded as the founder and principal theorist for the Hearing Voices Movement. Early life, family and education Romme studied medicine at the University of Amsterdam, where he also received his PhD in 1967.
Go to Profile#37313
Dmitry Zubarev
#37325
Overall Influence
1917 - 1992 (75 years)
Dmitry Nikolayevich Zubarev was a Soviet and Russian theoretical physicist known for his contributions to statistical mechanics, non-equilibrium thermodynamics, plasma physics, theory of turbulence, and to the development of the double-time Green function's formalism.
Go to Profile#37314
Paul van Buren
#37326
Overall Influence
1924 - 1998 (74 years)
Paul Matthews van Buren was a Christian theologian and author. An ordained Episcopal priest, he was a Professor of religion at Temple University, Philadelphia for 22 years. He was a Director [NYT obituary says "Associate"] of the Center of Ethics and Religious Pluralism at the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem.
Go to Profile#37315
Esther Brimmer
#37327
Overall Influence
1961 - Present (65 years)
Esther Diane Brimmer is an American foreign policy expert and former Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs. In June 2013, she left her post as Assistant Secretary and returned to academia.
Go to Profile#37316
Sergei Vonsovsky
#37328
Overall Influence
1910 - 1998 (88 years)
Sergei Vasilyevich Vonsovsky was a Soviet physicist. He was named a Hero of Socialist Labour in 1969. Biography Sergei Vonsovsky was born in 1910 in Tashkent. In 1932 he graduated from the Leningrad University. In 1932 he moved to Sverdlovsk and started working at the Ural Physicotechical Institute, later – at the Metals Physics Institute of the Ural branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences. In 1943 he defended his second thesis and received the highest scientific degree of Doctor of Sciences. From 1947 he also kept a professorship at the chair of theoretical physics at the department of physics of the Ural State University.
Go to Profile#37317
Julian Morris
#37329
Overall Influence
2000 - Present (26 years)
Julian Morris was formerly a Research Fellow and subsequently Director of the Environment and Technology Programme of the Institute of Economic Affairs. He is also a visiting professor of Economics at the University of Buckingham. Recently, he became co-editor with Indur M. Goklany of the Electronic Journal of Sustainable Development]. Morris serves on the editorial advisory board of the academic journal, Energy & Environment.
Go to Profile#37318
Richard Thompson
#37330
Overall Influence
Richard Charles Thompson is a marine biologist who researches marine litter. At the University of Plymouth he is director of the Marine Institute; professor of Marine Biology; and leads the International Marine Litter Research Unit. Thompson coined the term "microplastics" in 2004.
Go to Profile#37319
Juha Sihvola
#37331
Overall Influence
1957 - 2012 (55 years)
Juha Sihvola was a Finnish philosopher and historian. He was a university professor of general history from 2000, and part of The Academy of Finland's Centre of Excellence program upon Philosophical Psychology, Morality and Politics, serving as the Deputy Director of the Centre of Excellence from 2008. In the years 2004–2009, he was the Director of Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies.
Go to Profile#37320
Peter R. Last
#37332
Overall Influence
Peter Robert Last is an Australian ichthyologist, curator of the Australian National Fish Collection and a senior principal research scientist at CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research in Hobart, Tasmania. He is an elasmobranch expert and has described many new species of shark.
Go to Profile#37321
Ashitey Trebi-Ollennu
#37333
Overall Influence
Ashitey Trebi-Ollennu, is a Ghanaian robotics engineer at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the chief engineer and technical group leader for the mobility and manipulation group at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory He has been associated with various NASA Mars missions, notably the Mars Rover and InSight projects.
Go to Profile#37322
Morley Winograd
#37334
Overall Influence
Morley Winograd is an American author and speaker. He serves as a Senior Fellow at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School’s Center on Communication Leadership and Policy. Michael D. Hais is a Principal of Mike & Morley and the co-author of "Millennial Momentum: How A New Generation Is Remaking America" and "Millennial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube, and the Future of American Politics" . He is also a fellow with NDN, a Democratic think tank.
Go to Profile#37323
Soliman Abdel-hady Soliman
#37335
Overall Influence
Dr. Soliman Abdel-hady Soliman was an Egyptian professor of electrical engineering focusing on power and machines sector. Since 1997, he has been Professor of Electric Power System Analysis, Electrical Power & Machines Department, at Ain Shams University in Cairo, Egypt,
Go to Profile#37324
Salah Zulfikar
#37336
Overall Influence
1926 - 1993 (67 years)
Salah El-Din Ahmed Mourad Zulfikar was an Egyptian actor and film producer. He started his career as a police officer in the Egyptian National Police, before becoming an actor in 1956. He is regarded as one of the most influential actors in the history of Egyptian film industry. Zulfikar had roles in more than hundred feature films in multiple genres during a 37-year career, mostly as the leading actor, he was one of the most dominant leading men in the Egyptian cinema.
Go to Profile#37325
Henning Bergenholtz
#37337
Overall Influence
1944 - Present (82 years)
Henning John Bergenholtz is a Danish linguist, who is head of Center for Lexicography at Aarhus School of Business in Denmark. Professor Bergenholtz has contributed to lexicography as a science with publications on theoretical lexicography as well as several printed and electronic dictionaries.
Go to Profile#37326
Haim Zafrani
#37338
Overall Influence
1922 - 2004 (82 years)
Haim Zafrani , born in 1922 in Essaouira-2004 Zafrani is particularly noted for having collected and preserved much or the music and oral poetry of the Jews of Morocco. He recorded, and thereby preserved, the melodies of Rabbi David Buzaglo , widely acclaimed as the greatest paytan of his time.
Go to Profile#37327
Mark Mazzetti
#37339
Overall Influence
1974 - Present (52 years)
Mark Mazzetti is an American journalist who works for the New York Times. He is currently a Washington Investigative Correspondent for the Times. Life Mazzetti was born in Washington, D.C. He attended Regis High School in New York City. He graduated from Duke University with a bachelor's degree in Public Policy and History. Later, he earned a master's degree in history from Oxford University.
Go to Profile#37328
James F. Holland
#37340
Overall Influence
1925 - 2018 (93 years)
James Frederick Holland was an American physician and Distinguished Professor of Neoplastic Diseases at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York. Early in his career, he had worked for the National Cancer Institute and Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Go to Profile#37329
Michael Farthing
#37341
Overall Influence
1948 - Present (78 years)
Michael John Godfrey Farthing is British emeritus professor at the University of Sussex, where he was previously its vice-chancellor . His early academic career was in medicine, specialising in gastroenterology.
Go to Profile#37330
Alvin A. Lee
#37342
Overall Influence
1930 - Present (96 years)
Alvin A. Lee , is a Canadian literary critic and former academic administrator. Career The majority of his academic career—some 39 years—was spent at McMaster University in Hamilton; he served as President and vice-chancellor of that university from 1980 to 1990. He also served as Chairman of the Council of Ontario Universities. The McMaster Museum of Art is housed in a building named in his honour because of his work acquiring extensive and valuable art collections for McMaster University. He received honorary doctorates from Victoria University in the University of Toronto, and from McMast...
Go to Profile#37331
Kannon Shanmugam
#37343
Overall Influence
1972 - Present (54 years)
Kannon Kumar Shanmugam is an American lawyer known for his litigation at the U.S. Supreme Court. He became a partner at the law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison in 2019, and became the managing partner of the firm's Washington, D.C. office and chair of its Supreme Court and appellate practice group. Shanmugam was mentioned as a possible Solicitor General or judicial nominee in the 2017–2021 Donald Trump administration.
Go to Profile#37332
C. F. Jeff Wu
#37344
Overall Influence
1949 - Present (77 years)
Chien-Fu Jeff Wu is the Coca-Cola Chair in Engineering Statistics and Professor in the H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He is known for his work on the convergence of the EM algorithm, resampling methods such as the bootstrap and jackknife, and industrial statistics, including design of experiments, and robust parameter design .
Go to Profile#37333
Michael Dean
#37345
Overall Influence
1977 - Present (49 years)
Michael Dean is a British artist, living and working in London, United Kingdom. In 2016 he was shortlisted for the Turner Prize. Dean's sculptural work is focused on typefaces. He graduated from Goldsmiths, University of London in 2001 with a BA Fine Art .
Go to Profile#37334
Axel Cleeremans
#37346
Overall Influence
1962 - Present (64 years)
Axel Cleeremans is a Research Director with the National Fund for Scientific Research and a professor of cognitive science with the Department of Psychology of the Université Libre de Bruxelles, Brussels.
Go to Profile#37335
Nivek Ogre
#37347
Overall Influence
1962 - Present (64 years)
Kevin Graham Ogilvie , known professionally as Nivek Ogre, is a Canadian musician, performance artist and actor, best known for his work with the industrial music group Skinny Puppy, which he co-founded with cEvin Key. Since 1982, he has served as Skinny Puppy's primary lyricist and vocalist, occasionally providing instrumentation and samples. Ogre's charismatic personality, guttural vocals and use of costumes, props, and fake blood on stage helped widen Skinny Puppy's fanbase and has inspired numerous other musicians.
Go to Profile#37336
Naomi Mezey
#37348
Overall Influence
Naomi Jewel Mezey is an American legal scholar and is a professor of law at Georgetown University. Mezey contributes significantly to the field of law and culture, with additional scholarly interests in legal theory and translation and statutory interpretation.
Go to Profile#37337
Zafer İlken
#37349
Overall Influence
1960 - Present (66 years)
Prof. Dr. Zafer İlken is a Turkish educator, university administrator and the author/co-author of numerous scientific papers, who has been serving as the third rector of the İzmir Institute of Technology, founded in 1992.
Go to Profile#37338
Poul Jørgensen
#37350
Overall Influence
1944 - Present (82 years)
Poul Jørgensen is professor of chemistry at the Department of Chemistry, Aarhus University , Denmark and director of the qLEAP Center for Theoretical Chemistry at AU, which was established in April 2012. Jørgensen has made seminal contributions to the field of electronic structure theory. He is also one of the main authors of the DALTON program and a member of the International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science.
Go to Profile#37339
Martin McDonagh
#37351
Overall Influence
1970 - Present (56 years)
Martin Faranan McDonagh is a British-Irish playwright and filmmaker. He is known for his absurdist black humour which often challenges the modern theatre aesthetic. He has received numerous accolades including an Academy Award, six BAFTA Awards, four Golden Globe Awards, three Olivier Awards, and nominations for five Tony Awards.
Go to Profile#37340
Raymond Kethledge
#37352
Overall Influence
1966 - Present (60 years)
Raymond Michael Kethledge is a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He was appointed by President George W. Bush in 2008. Kethledge appeared on Donald Trump's list of potential Supreme Court of the United States nominees in 2016, and was described by press reports as a finalist in President Trump's nomination to replace Anthony Kennedy on the court.
Go to Profile#37341
Herbert Mitgang
#37353
Overall Influence
1920 - 2013 (93 years)
Herbert Mitgang was an American author, editor, journalist, playwright, and producer of television news documentaries. Life Born in Manhattan, he graduated with a law degree from what is now St. John's University. While a student he wrote sports articles for The Brooklyn Eagle.
Go to Profile#37342
Adya Prasad Pandey
#37354
Overall Influence
Prof. Adya Prasad Pandey is notable person with various development in field of education and economic activity in Country . ,currently he is having State Minister Cadre in Government of Manipur. He is Former Vice Chancellor of Manipur University. Prof. Pandey is currently National President of Indian Economic Association ,'One of the Biggest Association of Economist',Prof. Pandey is also Independent Director of National Small Industries Corporation National Small Industries Corporation
Go to Profile#37343
James Freeman Gilbert
#37355
Overall Influence
1931 - 2014 (83 years)
James Freeman Gilbert was an American geophysicist, best known for his work with George E. Backus on inverting geophysical data, and also for his role in establishing an international network of long-period seismometers.
Go to Profile#37344
Robyn Carston
#37356
Overall Influence
1950 - Present (76 years)
Robyn Anne Carston, is a linguist and academic, who specialises in pragmatics, semantics, and the philosophy of language. Since 2005, she has been Professor of Linguistics at University College London.
Go to Profile#37345
Klaus Zimmermann
#37357
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (74 years)
Klaus Felix Zimmermann is a German economist and emeritus professor of economics at Bonn University. Additionally, he is an honorary professor at Maastricht University, the Free University of Berlin and the Renmin University of China as well as president of the Global Labor Organization. His research interests include population, labour, development and migration, with Zimmermann being among the leading economists on the topic of migration.
Go to Profile#37346
Povl Ole Fanger
#37358
Overall Influence
1934 - 2006 (72 years)
Povl Ole Fanger was an expert in the field of thermal comfort and perception of indoor environments. He was a senior professor at the International Centre for Indoor Environment and Energy at the Technical University of Denmark. He was a visiting University Professor at Syracuse University when he died at the age of 72 from an abdominal aortic aneurysm. His work is credited with demonstrating that poor air quality in homes can cause asthma in children, and that poor air quality in workplaces decreases productivity. His contribution to the research on thermal comfort still defines the state of the art in HVAC technology and the basis for international standardisation.
Go to Profile#37347
Leslie Roberts
#37359
Overall Influence
1962 - Present (64 years)
Leslie Roberts is a Canadian television and radio personality, who recently left Ottawa as the host of CTV Morning Live and his talkshow 9-noon on CFRA in Ottawa. He was previously the host of The Leslie Roberts Show on CJAD in Montreal. From 2001-2015 he was anchor and senior editor at Global Toronto.
Go to Profile#37348
Edward P. J. Corbett
#37360
Overall Influence
1919 - 1998 (79 years)
Edward P.J. Corbett was an American rhetorician, educator, and scholarly author. Corbett chaired the 1970 Conference on College Composition and Communication, and was chair of the organization and a member of the National Council of Teachers of English Executive Committee in 1971. He was also chair of the Rhetoric Society of America from 1973 to 1977. From 1974 to 1979, he was editor of the journal College Composition and Communication. He is known for promoting classical rhetoric among composition scholars and teachers.
Go to Profile#37349
Henry Greely
#37361
Overall Influence
1952 - Present (74 years)
Henry T. "Hank" Greely is an American lawyer, a leading authority on the ethical, legal, and social implications of new biomedical technologies, particularly those related to genetics, assisted reproduction, neuroscience and stem cell research.
Go to Profile#37350
Arthur Brown
#37362
Overall Influence
1942 - Present (84 years)
Arthur Wilton Brown is an English singer and songwriter best known for his flamboyant and theatrical performances, eclectic work and his powerful, wide-ranging operatic voice, in particular his high pitched banshee screams. He is also notable for his unique stage persona, featuring extreme facepaint and a burning helmet.
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