







The Most Famous
Chemists from Germany
Trending Chemists from Germany This Week
The top 10 Chemists from Germany trending on Wikipedia in the past 7 days, with a quick note on what drove the spike.
- #1

Mai Thi Nguyen-Kim
b. 1987
Trending in German (#83) Wikipedia (2,822 views, on Mar 8).
Top 10 Chemists
The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the top 10 most legendary Germans Chemists of all time. This list of famous Germans Chemists is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography's online popularity. Visit the rankings page to view the entire list of Germans Chemists.
- #1

Emil Fischer
1852 - 1919
HPI 80.8286 langsEmil Fischer is most famous for his work on the purine and pyrimidine bases of DNA.
- #2

August Kekulé
1829 - 1896
HPI 79.3662 langsAugust Kekulé is most famous for his discovery of the ring-shaped structure of benzene.
- #3

Adolf Windaus
1876 - 1959
HPI 78.8962 langsAdolf Windaus was a German chemist who won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1928 for his work on the structure of chlorophyll.
- #4

Ernst Chain
1906 - 1979
HPI 78.7961 langsThe Ernst Chain is most famous for its role in the development of the polio vaccine. In 1952, Dr. Jonas Salk and his team of researchers...Read moreShow less
The Ernst Chain is most famous for its role in the development of the polio vaccine. In 1952, Dr. Jonas Salk and his team of researchers isolated the virus that causes polio and developed a vaccine that would prevent the disease.
- #5

Eduard Buchner
1860 - 1917
HPI 78.7876 langsEduard Buchner was a German chemist who is most famous for his discovery of lactic acid fermentation.
- #6

Friedrich Wöhler
1800 - 1882
HPI 78.4363 langsFriedrich Wöhler is most famous for his synthesis of urea, which disproved the idea that organic compounds could only be created by living...Read moreShow less
Friedrich Wöhler is most famous for his synthesis of urea, which disproved the idea that organic compounds could only be created by living organisms.
- #7

Carl Wilhelm Scheele
1742 - 1786
HPI 78.3570 langsCarl Wilhelm Scheele is most famous for discovering oxygen.
- #8

Hans Adolf Krebs
1900 - 1981
HPI 78.3463 langsHans Adolf Krebs was a German scientist and professor of medicine. He is most famous for discovering the citric acid cycle, a series of...Read moreShow less
Hans Adolf Krebs was a German scientist and professor of medicine. He is most famous for discovering the citric acid cycle, a series of chemical reactions that produce energy in cells.
- #9

Otto Hahn
1879 - 1968
HPI 78.0485 langsOtto Hahn was a German chemist who is most famous for the discovery of nuclear fission.
- #10

Richard Willstätter
1872 - 1942
HPI 77.3563 langsRichard Willstätter is most famous for his work on the chemical structure of chlorophyll.
People by Birth Decade
Browse notable Germans Chemists grouped by birth decade. Each decade shows the top 10 by HPI; expand to see everyone.
1980s(1)
1960s(2)
1950s(2)
1920s(2)
1870s(10)
1850s(8)
1830s(12)
1810s(8)
1790s(7)
1760s(1)
1700s(1)
1650s(1)
1630s(1)
1600s(1)
1550s(1)
Overlapping Lives
Which Chemists were alive at the same time? This visualization shows the lifespans of the 25 most globally memorable Chemists since 1700.



































































































