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Contents |
Heads of state and Heads of government
- Gordon Brown [r]: Prime Minister of the United Kingdom since June 2007; Leader of the Labour Party (born 1951). [e]
- John Russell, 1st Earl Russell, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
- Henry Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
- Charles Tupper, Prime Minister of Canada
- Julius Nyerere, first President of Tanzania
- Yun Po Sun, President of South Korea
- Hastings Banda, President of Malawi
- William Walker, President of Nicaragua
- Arthur St. Clair, President of the Continental Congress
Academics
Mathematics
- Sir Michael Atiyah, mathematician, winner of Abel Prize, (Maths' equivalent of the Nobel Prize)
- Colin MacLaurin [r]: (1698–1746) Scottish mathematician who published the first systematic exposition of Newton's calculus. [e]
- John Playfair [r]: (1748-1819) Scottish mathematician, best known for his explanation and promotion of the work of James Hutton [e]
Biology
- Charles Darwin [r]: (1809 – 1882) English natural scientist, most famous for proposing the theory of natural selection. [e]
- Richard Owen [r]: (1804–1892) English comparative anatomist and palaeontologist, best remembered for coining the word Dinosauria and for his opposition to Charles Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection. [e]
- Edward Albert Sharpey-Schafer [r]: (1850 – 1935) Physiologist who coined the words "insulin" and "endocrine" and who demonstrated the existence of adrenaline. [e]
- Fleeming Jenkin [r]: (1833 – 1885) Professor of Engineering at the University of Edinburgh, known as the inventor of telpherage. [e]
Medicine
- Alexander Monro primus [r]: (1697 – 1767) Anatomist; the founder of Edinburgh Medical School. [e]
- Alexander Monro secundus [r]: (1733 - 1817) Professor of Anatomy at the University of Edinburgh, known as the discoverer of the lymphatic system. [e]
- William Cullen [r]: (1710-1790) The leading British physician of the 18th century. [e]
- Joseph Lister [r]: (1827 – 1912) Surgeon who promoted the idea of sterile surgery. [e]
- James Young Simpson [r]: (1811 – 1870) Scottish doctor who discovered the anaesthetic properties of chloroform and introduced it for general medical use. [e]
- John Forbes [r]: (1787-1861), physician and medical journalist [e]
- Andrew Duncan [r]: (1744- 1877) Scottish medical reformer, best known for his humane treatment of the mentally ill. [e]
- Peter Doherty [r]: (1940 - ), winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1996 for his
research on immunology. [e]
Chemistry
- Joseph Black [r]: (1728 – 1799) Scottish physicist and chemist, known for his discoveries of latent heat, specific heat, and carbon dioxide [e]
- John Davy [r]: (1790 – 1868) British chemist most noted for his discovery of phosgene. [e]
- Daniel Rutherford [r]: (1749 - 1815) Scottish chemist, best known for the discovery of nitrogen. [e]
- Thomas Anderson [r]: (1819 – 1874) Scottish chemist remembered for discovering pyridine. [e]
- Peter D. Mitchell [r]: (1920 – 1992), awarded the 1978 Nobel Prize for Chemistry for his discovery of the chemiosmotic mechanism of ATP synthesis. [e]
Economics
- James Mirrlees [r]: (1936 - ) Scottish economist, winner of the 1996 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for fundamental contributions to the economic theory of incentives under asymmetric information. [e]
- Adam Smith [r]: Scottish moral philosopher and political economist (1723-1790), a major contributor to the modern perception of free market economics; author of Wealth of Nations (1776). [e]
Physics
- Thomas Anderson [r]: (1819 – 1874) Scottish chemist remembered for discovering pyridine. [e]
- Peter Higgs [r]: Add brief definition or description
- James Clerk Maxwell [r]: (1831 – 1879) Scottish physicist best known for his formulation of electromagnetic theory and the statistical theory of gases. [e]
- Thomas Young [r]: (1773-1829) English scientist who showed how the eye's lens focus light, proposed the three-color explanation of color vision, established the wave nature of light, defined energy in the modern sense, improved on Hooke's law, and helped decipher the Rosetta Stone. [e] Young entered the University of Edinburgh in 1794 (as a Quaker he could not study at Oxford or Cambridge). After a year of study he went to the University of Göttingen.
- Edward Victor Appleton [r]: (1892 – 1965) English physicist who received the 1947 Nobel Prize in Physics for his contributions to the knowledge of the ionosphere, which led to the development of radar. [e]
- Charles Glover Barkla [r]: (1877 – 1944) English physicist who was awarded the 1917 Nobel Prize in Physics for his discovery of the characteristic X-rays of elements. [e]
- Max Born [r]: (1882 – 1970) German-born British physicist and mathematician instrumental in the development of quantum mechanics, who won the 1954 Nobel Prize in Physics. [e]
- Igor Tamm [r]: Add brief definition or description
Geology
- James Hutton [r]: (1726–1797) Scottish farmer and naturalist, who is known as the founder of modern geology. [e]
Philosophy
- Erasmus Darwin [r]: (1731-1802) Physician, poet, philosopher, botanist, and naturalist; grandfather of Charles Darwin. [e]
- David Hume [r]: (1711-1776) Scottish philosopher, economist, and historian. [e]
- Dugald Stewart [r]: (1753 - 1828) Scottish philosopher of the "common-sense" school who played a major role in making the "Scottish philosophy" predominant in 19th century Europe; known for his theory of taste. [e]
- Adam Ferguson [r]: A philosopher and historian of the Scottish Enlightenment (1723-1816). [e]
History
- Thomas Carlyle [r]: (1795 – 1881) Scottish essayist, satirist, and historian; a conservative, known for his analysis of how revolutionary cultures turn into repressive dogmatisms, and also for his distaste for democracy and for arguments used in defence of slavery. [e]
Architecture
- Robert Adam [r]: (1728-1792) Neoclassical architect, interior designer and furniture designer. [e]
Inventors
- Alexander Graham Bell [r]: (1847 – 1922) Scottish scientist credited with inventing the first practical telephone. [e]
- James Dewar [r]: (1842 – 1923) Scottish chemist and physicist best-known for his invention of the Dewar flask. [e]
- John Boyd Dunlop [r]: (1840 – 1921) Scottish inventor, founder of the Dunlop Pneumatic Tyre Company. [e]
- John Shepherd-Barron [r]: Add brief definition or description
- Thomas Aikenhead [r]: The last person to be executed for blasphemy in the UK. [e]
- John Dunlop [r]: (1840 – 1921) Inventor of the first practical inflatable tyre and founder of the rubber company that bore his name. He studied to be a veterinary surgeon at the Dick Vet, University of Edinburgh, and pursued this profession for nearly ten years. [e]
- Peter Roget [r]: Add brief definition or description
- Elizabeth Blackadder [r]: (born 1931) Scottish painter and printmaker; the first woman to be elected to both the Royal Scottish Academy and the Royal Academy. [e]
- A.S. Neill [r]: Add brief definition or description
- Michael Swann [r]: Add brief definition or description
Nobel Laureates
The University is associated with nine Nobel Prize winners (Source: http://www.ed.ac.uk/studying/postgraduate/edinburgh/alumni.html)
Writers
- J. M. Barrie [r]: (1860 – 1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist, best known as the creator of "Peter Pan" [e]
- James Boswell [r]: (1740 - 1795) Scottish author, best known as Samuel Johnson’s biographer, and for the detailed and frank diaries that he kept for much of his life. [e]
- Henry Mackenzie [r]: (1745 - 1831), Scottish writer, nicknamed 'The Man of Feeling' after the title of his best known novel. [e]
- Ian Rankin [r]: (1960 - ) Crime writer, creator of Inspector Rebus [e]
- Sir Walter Scott [r]: (1771 – 1832) Scottish historical novelist popular throughout Europe in his lifetime; his novels include Ivanhoe, Rob Roy, 'and The Heart of Midlothian. [e]
- Alexander McCall Smith [r]: Add brief definition or description
- Robert Louis Stevenson [r]: British 19th-century writer whose works included Kidnapped, Treasure Island and Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. [e]
- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle [r]: (1859 – 1930) Scottish author best known as the creator of the detective "Sherlock Holmes". [e]
- John Home [r]: (1722–1808) Scottish poet and dramatist. [e]
Sports
- Chris Hoy, track cyclist
- Andy Irvine (rugby player), rugby player and president of the Scottish Rugby Union
- Eric Liddell, athlete men's 400 metres gold medallist
University Officials
- Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, The Chancellor of the University (1953-present)
- Sir Alexander Fleming, Former Rector of the University (1951-1953)
- The Rt Hon Sir Winston Churchill, Former Rector of the University (1929-1932)
- The Rt Hon David Lloyd George, Former Rector of the University (1920-1923)
- Sir David Steel (Lord Steel of Aikwood), Rector of the University (1982-1985)
