Search People Result | Academic Influence

Find the most important people in 24 academic disciplines from 4000 BCE to today

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 proprietary AI program, we have ranked everyone in Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef based on the number of citations, publications, and academically relevant web presence.

Students and researchers now have the easiest and fastest way to find influential thinkers from 24 disciplines and 300 sub-disciplines (and growing). If you ever wanted to find famous medieval biologists, or influential engineers during the industrial revolution, now you can!

We’ve also put together our own custom rankings of people by discipline. And speaking of influential people, don’t forget to check out the interviews we do with the influential people of today!

Use the power of AI for your research! Simply select the discipline (and optional subdiscipline) most relevant to your research, and the time periods of interest, and get enlightening results.

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List of the most influential people for the years 2010 – 2020

Mike Pence

#14220

Overall Influence

1959 - Present (64 years)

Michael Richard Pence is an American politician who served as the 48th vice president of the United States from 2017 to 2021 under President Donald Trump. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as the 50th governor of Indiana from 2013 to 2017. Pence was also a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from 2001 to 2013.

Woody Harrelson

Woody Harrelson

#38555

Overall Influence

1961 - Present (62 years)

Woodrow Tracy Harrelson is an American actor and playwright. He is the recipient of various accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award and two Screen Actors Guild Awards, in addition to nominations for three Academy Awards and four Golden Globe Awards.

Peter Kassig

#146403

Overall Influence

1988 - 2014 (26 years)

Peter Edward Kassig , also known as Abdul-Rahman Kassig, was an American aid worker who was beheaded by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. Early life and education Kassig was born and raised in Indianapolis, Indiana. As a child, he was adopted by Ed, a school teacher, and Paula Kassig, a nurse. Kassig attended North Central High School in Indianapolis, graduating in 2006. After his medical discharge from the Army in 2007, Kassig was a student at Hanover College from 2007 to 2009 and Butler University from 2011 to 2012.

Walter LaFeber

#21390

Overall Influence

1933 - 2021 (88 years)

Walter Fredrick LaFeber was an American academic who served as the Andrew H. and James S. Tisch Distinguished University Professor in the Department of History at Cornell University. Previous to that he served as the Marie Underhill Noll Professor of History and a Stephen H. Weiss Presidential Fellow at Cornell.

Ginnifer Goodwin

Ginnifer Goodwin

#224780

Overall Influence

1978 - Present (45 years)

Jennifer Michelle "Ginnifer" Goodwin is an American actress. She is known for her starring role as Margene Heffman in the HBO drama series Big Love and Snow White / Mary Margaret Blanchard in the ABC fantasy series Once Upon a Time .

Eric Holcomb

#224953

Overall Influence

1968 - Present (55 years)

Eric Joseph Holcomb is an American politician who is the 51st and current governor of Indiana, serving since 2017. A member of the Republican Party, he served as the 51st lieutenant governor of Indiana from 2016 to 2017 under Governor Mike Pence, who left the governorship in 2017 to become the vice president of the United States. Holcomb was nominated to fill the remainder of Lieutenant Governor Sue Ellspermann's term after she resigned on March 2, 2016, to become president of Ivy Tech Community College. He won the 2016 election for governor of Indiana over Democratic nominee John R. Gregg. H...

Richard Lesh

#162535

Overall Influence

Richard Arthur Lesh, Jr. is a professor of learning sciences, cognitive science, and mathematics education at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. He retired from the IU system in 2012. He graduated from Indiana University in 1971 with a Ph.D. in mathematics, cognitive psychology, and statistics for research in the social sciences. He is also a graduate of Hanover College, where he received a B.A. in mathematics and physics.

Chris Culver

#260822

Overall Influence

Chris Culver is the pen name of an American author of crime fiction and thrillers. His books are set in and around the Midwestern United States. He is well known for his works featuring IMPD Detective Ashraf Rashid. His debut novel, The Abbey, was on The New York Times bestseller list for 16 weeks. He has since gone on to write several stand alone books and is currently working on a new series set in St. Louis.

David L. Armstrong

#165688

Overall Influence

1941 - 2017 (76 years)

David Lawrence Armstrong was an American politician. He served as the mayor of Louisville, Kentucky from 1999 to 2003. He was the city's last mayor before its merger with Jefferson County to form Louisville Metro.

Bertha Lewis

#258418

Overall Influence

1951 - Present (72 years)

Bertha Lewis is the founder and president of the Black Institute, an 'action tank' whose mission is 'to shape intellectual discourse and dialogue and impact public policy uniquely from a Black perspective .' She was the CEO and Chief Organizer of the nonprofit social justice organization ACORN until it disbanded in 2010. In early 2014, she was a member of New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio's Transition Team.

Monica Sone

#102153

Overall Influence

1919 - 2011 (92 years)

Monica Sone , born Kazuko Itoi, was a Japanese American writer, best known for her 1953 autobiographical memoir Nisei Daughter, which tells of the Japanese American experience in Seattle during the 1920s and 1930s, and in the World War II internment camps and which is an important text in Asian American and Women's Studies courses.

Philip Hedrick

#269847

Overall Influence

1942 - Present (81 years)

Philip W. Hedrick is an American emeritus professor at Arizona State University . From 1992 until his retirement, Hedrick was Ullman Professor of Conservation Biology at ASU. Hedrick has published over 200 articles on the topics of population genetics and conservation biology. Among other organisms, he has published extensively on wolves and bighorn sheep.

Terri Stoneburner

#364567

Overall Influence

1945 - Present (78 years)

Terri J. Stoneburner is an American lawyer and judge from the U.S. state of Minnesota. She is a former judge of the Minnesota Court of Appeals. Education and career Stoneburner earned her undergraduate degree from Hanover College in 1967. She earned her J.D. from the University of Washington Law School in 1972.

Judith Moffett

#241265

Overall Influence

1942 - Present (81 years)

Judith Moffett is an American author and academic. She has published poetry, nonfiction, science fiction, and translations of Swedish literature. She has been awarded grants and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities and presented a paper on the translation of poetry at a 1998 Nobel Symposium.

William B. Rossow

#298007

Overall Influence

1947 - Present (76 years)

William B. Rossow is an American atmospheric scientist, who was for many years the head of the International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project. He is currently a Distinguished Professor at City University of New York, and also a published author. He is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union and American Mathematical Society.

Joan Leitzel

#415837

Overall Influence

1936 - Present (87 years)

Joan Ruth Leitzel is an American mathematician and university administrator. She was the president of the University of New Hampshire from 1996 to 2002. She received the Charles Holmes Pettee Medal in 2002 for her contributions to the University of New Hampshire. She attended Hanover College , Brown University , and Indiana University .

Micah Shrewsberry

#633501

Overall Influence

1976 - Present (47 years)

Micah Shrewsberry is an American basketball coach and former college basketball player. He is the current head coach for the Penn State Nittany Lions of the Big Ten Conference. Playing career Shrewsberry attended Cathedral High School in Indianapolis, Indiana, and played collegiately at Hanover College where he was a three-year starter and tri-captain, while leading the league in free throw percentage and assists during the 1998–99 season.

Brett Dietz

#800219

Overall Influence

1981 - Present (42 years)

Brett Dietz is American football coach and former quarterback. He is the head football coach at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, a position he has held since 2020. Dietz played college football at Hanover College in Hanover, Indiana and professionally with several teams in the Arena Football League , Af2, and the National Indoor Football League including the Cincinnati Marshals, Louisville Fire, Tampa Bay Storm and California Redwoods.

John Merle Coulter

John Merle Coulter

#52949

Overall Influence

1851 - 1928 (77 years)

John Merle Coulter, Ph. D. was an American botanist and educator. In his career in education administration, Coulter is notable for serving as the president of Indiana University and Lake Forest College and the head of the Department of Botany at the University of Chicago.

Peter Dunn

#1083829

Overall Influence

1977 - Present (46 years)

Peter Dunn is an American financial author, radio host, television personality, and speaker. Author of 60 Days to Change: A Daily How-To Guide with Actionable Tips for Improving Your Financial Life and founder of Advanced Planning Solutions , Dunn was host of Skills Your Dad Never Taught You on NewsTalk 1430 .

J. Christopher Howk

#1321117

Overall Influence

Tony Vittorio

#804896

Overall Influence

Tony Vittorio is a college baseball player and coach. He is currently the head coach of the Wilmington Quakers baseball team. He was the head baseball coach of the Dayton Flyers baseball program. Vittorio has been the head coach at Dayton since the 2000 season, accumulating over 350 wins and overseeing the construction of the Flyers' Woerner Field.

Rachel Davidson

#1488414

Overall Influence

Bob Donewald

#1051956

Overall Influence

1942 - Present (81 years)

Bob Donewald, Sr. is a retired American college basketball coach. He was the first coach to lead Illinois State University to the NCAA post-season national tournament, and he did so for three consecutive seasons. His 1983 team gave Illinois State its first Missouri Valley Conference basketball championship and his 1984 team captured Illinois State's first Division I NCAA Tournament victory. He coached at South Bend St. Joseph's High School for 8 seasons, from 1965–66 to 1972–73.

Harvey Washington Wiley

Harvey Washington Wiley

#24331

Overall Influence

1844 - 1930 (86 years)

Harvey Washington Wiley was an American chemist who fought for the passage of the landmark Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 and subsequently worked at the Good Housekeeping Institute laboratories. He was the first commissioner of the United States Food and Drug Administration.

Ellen J Yezierski

#2660467

Overall Influence

Charilaos Skiadas

#3211287

Overall Influence

R. Jeffrey Moffatt

#1261608

Overall Influence

Brian G Gall

#3460576

Overall Influence

Carl K. Benhase

#2216058

Overall Influence

1929 - 2018 (89 years)

Carl Kenneth "Benny" Benhase was an American football player and coach. He served as the head football coach at Hanover College in Hanover, Indiana in 1963, compiling a record of 0–9. Benhase played college football at Miami University under head coach Woody Hayes. As a high school football coach in Ohio, he was an early pioneer of the no-huddle offense.

Jeffrey A. Hughes

#1849102

Overall Influence

Bryant A. Stamford

#990746

Overall Influence

Mi Yung Yoon

#2894130

Overall Influence

William Abbott Oldfather

William Abbott Oldfather

#311967

Overall Influence

1880 - 1945 (65 years)

William Abbott Oldfather was an American classical scholar. He was influential for building strong academic traditions in classical studies at the University of Illinois and for his studies of ancient Locris in Greece.

Jordan T. Harshman

#4739807

Overall Influence

M. Ross Alexander

#4637052

Overall Influence

Ashley Artese

#5230249

Overall Influence

Vahid Vahidi

#5270952

Overall Influence

Valerie Jean Young

#4030958

Overall Influence

Rick Rand

#3361414

Overall Influence

1957 - Present (66 years)

Rick W. Rand is an American politician and was a Democratic member of the Kentucky House of Representatives representing District 47 January 2003 to December 2020 after not running for re-election. Rand served non-consecutively in the Kentucky General Assembly from January 1991 until January 1995 in the Kentucky Senate District 26 seat.

Ellen Rydell Altermatt

#3055576

Overall Influence

John H. Krantz

#2501817

Overall Influence

Heyo Van Iten

#4661389

Overall Influence

Sara Mya Patterson

#6066499

Overall Influence

Dominique Battles

#6032996

Overall Influence

Heyo Van Iten

#3108401

Overall Influence

Walter J. Bruyninckx

#3966475

Overall Influence

Yefim Katsov

#4696889

Overall Influence

Sally A. Mitchell

#5517410

Overall Influence

Keith P. Anoop Georgia M. Roberts

#2858094

Overall Influence

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