Science
Scientists, doctors and engineers whose discoveries changed what we know. 127 people are remembered here. Light a candle, read their story, and add a memory of your own.
Jane Goodall1934 – 2025 · Primatologist and conservationistWhat you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.
264 candles · 12 tributes
Rudolph A. Marcus1923 – 2026 · Theoretical chemistNobel chemist who explained how electrons jump between molecules.
236 candles · 22 tributes
David Baltimore1938 – 2025 · Molecular biologistNobel virologist who proved RNA can make DNA and remade biology.
234 candles · 12 tributes
Isaac Newton1643 – 1727 · Mathematician and physicistIf I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.
203 candles · 11 tributes
Rosalind Franklin1920 – 1958 · Chemist and X-ray crystallographerScience and everyday life cannot and should not be separated.
196 candles · 11 tributes
Stephen Hawking1942 – 2018 · Theoretical physicistHowever difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at.
184 candles · 11 tributes
Nikola Tesla1856 – 1943 · Inventor and electrical engineerThe present is theirs; the future, for which I really worked, is mine.
154 candles · 15 tributes
Albert Einstein1879 – 1955 · Theoretical physicistImagination is more important than knowledge.
145 candles · 13 tributes
Marie Curie1867 – 1934 · Physicist and chemistNothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood.
130 candles · 13 tributes
Alan Turing1912 – 1954 · Mathematician and computer scientistSometimes it is the people no one imagines anything of who do the things no one can imagine.
115 candles · 15 tributes
Charles Darwin1809 – 1882 · NaturalistThere is grandeur in this view of life.
114 candles · 11 tributes
Yoshikazu Hasegawa1930 – 2026 · Vertebrate paleontologistHe showed Japan its first plesiosaur and spent a life reading fossil bones.
95 candles · 7 tributes
Mary Tsingou1928 – 2026 · PhysicistCoded the experiment that launched nonlinear science; later given her name in FPUT.
95 candles · 5 tributes
Gunther von Hagens1945 – 2026 · AnatomistInventor of plastination who put human anatomy before millions through Body Worlds.
72 candles · 9 tributes
Rachel Naomi Remen, MD1938 – 2026 · Physician (pediatrician / pediatric endocrinology background)Physician-patient who taught medicine to listen: curing is not the same as healing.
68 candles · 5 tributes
Richard E. Stearns1936 – 2026 · Computer scientistCo-founder of computational complexity who made hardness a science.
67 candles · 9 tributes
David Silverstein1944 – 2026 · CardiologistChicago-born cardiologist who built heart care in Kenya and stood by Moi for four decades.
64 candles · 9 tributes
Don Wilhelms1930 – 2026 · USGS planetary and lunar geologistLunar mapper who taught Apollo crews to read the Moon.
63 candles · 8 tributes
Krishna AchutaRao† 2026 · Climate scientistClimate attribution scientist who linked ocean warming and India's extremes to human influence.
61 candles · 6 tributes
Perry Mehrling1959 – 2026 · Economist and historian of money and financeEconomist and historian of money who taught a generation to see finance through balance sheets, and who believed deeply in young scholars.
12 candles · 1 tributes
Peter D. Thomas1973 – 2026 · Historian of political thought and Marxist theoristGramsci scholar whose Gramscian Moment remade Marxist political theory.
10 candles · 1 tributes
Anwar Shaikh1945 – 2026 · EconomistHe rebuilt economics from the classics and taught generations to see how capitalism really works.
10 candles · 1 tributes
Barry Luokkala1954 – 2026 · PhysicistCMU physics teaching professor who directed undergraduate labs and the Pennsylvania Governor's School for the Sciences.
10 candles · 1 tributes
Gerald Fischbach1938 – 2026 · Neuroscientist and physicianHe showed how nerve cells connect, and spent his life connecting scientists to each other.
9 candles · 1 tributes
Claude Cohen-Tannoudji1933 – 2026 · PhysicistHe taught light to tame atoms, and taught generations of physicists to think clearly.
9 candles · 1 tributes
Jan Kříž1974 – 2026 · Physicist and university rectorA physicist who lived and breathed for his university and its students.
9 candles · 1 tributes
Peter Barrett1940 – 2026 · Antarctic geologistAntarctic geologist who found the first tetrapod fossil on the ice and led Victoria University's polar research centre.
9 candles · 1 tributes
Tsuneko Okazaki1933 – 2026 · Molecular biologistShe and Reiji found the fragments that let life copy itself, and she carried their work on alone.
9 candles · 1 tributes
Barbara Finlay1950 – 2026 · Neuroscientist and psychology professor emeritaCornell neuroscientist who challenged how we think about brain development and evolution.
9 candles · 1 tributes
Edgar Morin1921 – 2026 · SociologistResistance fighter, humanist and theorist of complex thought, who taught the world to link what others separate.
9 candles · 1 tributes
Jürgen Habermas1929 – 2026 · Philosopher and social theoristGerman philosopher of the public sphere who believed democracy lives in free, reasoned conversation.
9 candles · 1 tributes
Sir Tony Hoare1934 – 2026 · Computer scientistInventor of Quicksort, Hoare logic and CSP, who taught the world that reliable software begins with simplicity.
9 candles · 1 tributes
Boris Ataev1957 – 2026 · Linguist and Caucasus scholarA son of Khunzakh who gave his life to the Avar language and the languages of Dagestan.
8 candles · 1 tributes
Andrei Doroshkevich1937 – 2026 · Astrophysicist and cosmologistCosmologist who foresaw that the afterglow of the Big Bang could be measured.
8 candles · 1 tributes
Dariusz Kołodziejczyk1962 – 2026 · HistorianWarsaw historian who opened the Ottoman and Crimean archives to the story of Poland's diplomacy.
8 candles · 1 tributes
Ionel Haiduc1937 – 2026 · ChemistRomanian chemist who led the Academy and built a world school of organometallic chemistry in Cluj.
8 candles · 1 tributes
Rafael Sorkin1945 – 2026 · American theoretical physicistThe physicist who imagined spacetime as grains and found entropy in entanglement.
8 candles · 1 tributes
Andrzej Elżanowski1950 – 2026 · PalaeontologistPolish palaeontologist of Mesozoic birds and a leading voice for animal ethics.
8 candles · 1 tributes
Hugh Kingery1932 – 2026 · BirderHe watched Colorado's birds for eight decades, and helped a state learn to see them too.
8 candles · 1 tributes
Jacqueline Feldman1936 – 2026 · French sociologist and authorPhysicist turned sociologist who helped spark the French women's liberation movement.
8 candles · 1 tributes
Edmund Phelps1933 – 2026 · Nobel Prize-winning economist and Columbia University professorNobel economist who put people and their expectations at the heart of macroeconomics.
8 candles · 1 tributes
Bashir Qabil1947 – 2026 · MathematicianDamascus mathematician who taught generations and helped give Arabic its words for mathematics.
7 candles · 1 tributes
B. Madhusoodana Kurup1954 – 2026 · Fisheries scientist and founding Vice-Chancellor of the Kerala University of Fisheries and Ocean StudiesFisheries scientist and teacher who built Kerala's fisheries university and gave a vanishing mahseer its name.
7 candles · 1 tributes
Philippe Tondeur1932 – 2026 · MathematicianFactory worker turned geometer who led American mathematical science at the NSF.
7 candles · 1 tributes
Malcolm H. Wiener1935 – 2026 · Aegean prehistorianThe philhellene patron and scholar who devoted his fortune to the prehistoric Aegean.
7 candles · 1 tributes