List of University of Edinburgh people

This is a list of notable graduates as well as non-graduate former students, academic staff, and university officials of the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. It also includes those who may be considered alumni by extension, having studied at institutions that later merged with the University of Edinburgh. The university is associated with 19 Nobel Prize laureates, three Turing Award winners, an Abel Prize laureate and Fields Medallist, four Pulitzer Prize winners, three Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom, and several Olympic gold medallists.

Government and politics

Heads of state and government

Leader	State/Government	Office
Hastings Banda^[1]^[2]	Malawi	Prime Minister (1964–1966), President (1966–1994)
Sir Robert Black^[3]	Colony of Singapore	Governor (1955–1957)
Sir Robert Black^[3]	British Hong Kong	Governor (1958–1964)
Sir Thomas Brisbane^[4]	New South Wales	Governor (1821–1825)
Gordon Brown^[5]	United Kingdom	Prime Minister (2007–2010)
Chang Taek-sang (張澤相)^[6]	South Korea	Prime Minister (1952)
John Crawfurd^[7]	Colonial Singapore	Resident (1823–1826)
Sir Gilbert Elliott^[8]	Anglo-Corsican Kingdom	Viceroy (1793–1796)
Sir Gilbert Elliott^[8]	British India	Governor-General (1807–1813)
Sir Dawda Jawara^[9]	Gambia Colony and Protectorate	Prime Minister (1962–1965)
Sir Dawda Jawara^[9]	The Gambia	Prime Minister (1965–1970), President (1970–1994)
Yusuf Lule^[10]	Uganda	President (1979)
Fawzi Mulki^[11]	Jordan	Prime Minister (1953-1954)
Lord Dunrossil^[12]	Australia	Governor-General (1960-1961)
Daniel Chanis Pinzón^[13]	Panama	President (1949)
Julius Nyerere^[14]^[15]	Tanganyika	Chief Minister (1960-1961), Prime Minister (1961-1962), President (1962-1964)
Julius Nyerere^[14]^[15]	Tanzania	President (1964–1985)
Paul Reeves^[16]	New Zealand	Governor-General (1985-1990)
Lord John Russell^[17]	United Kingdom	Prime Minister (1846–1852; 1865–1866)
Lord Palmerston^[18]	United Kingdom	Prime Minister (1855–1858; 1859–1865)
Sir Charles Tupper^[19]	Canada	Prime Minister (1896)
William Walker	Nicaragua	President (1856–1857)
Yun Posun (尹潽善)^[20]	South Korea	President (1960–1962)

United Kingdom

Caribbean

John Alcindor, Trinidadian doctor and politician
Charles Duncan O'Neal, Barbados politician
Edgar F. Gordon, doctor and trade union leader in Bermuda
David Pitt, Baron Pitt of Hampstead, Grenadian politician, the first person of African descent to stand as an MP (in Britain), the second person of African descent to sit in the House of Lords

Europe

Mina Andreeva, Chief Spokesperson for the European Commission
Gisela Babel, former member of the German Bundestag
Elmar Brok, former MEP for Germany, Chair of the European Parliament Committee on Foreign Affairs (1999-2007; 2012–2017) and President of the Union of European Federalists (2013-2018)
Benjamin Constant, French politician and eminent political theorist, Member of the Tribunat (1799–1802), Member of the Council of State (1815), Member of the Chamber of Députés (1819–1830)
Muriel Casals i Couturier, member of the Parliament of Catalonia
Biljana Đorđević, member of the Serbian National Assembly
Aina Calvo, former Mayoress of Palma, Spain
Furio Honsell, former Mayor of Udine, Italy
Jón Baldvin Hannibalsson, Icelandic Minister of Finance (1987-1988), Foreign Minister (1988-1995)
Ögmundur Jónasson, Icelandic Minister of Health (2009) and Minister of the Interior (2011-2013)
Hanna Birna Kristjánsdóttir, 19th Mayor of Reykjavík, Icelandic Minister of the Interior (2013-2014)
Árni Mathiesen, Icelandic Minister of Finance (2005-2009)
Angelika Niebler, MEP for Germany, Deputy Chairwomen for European People's Party (2015-)
Theodoros Roussopoulos, Greek Minister of State (2004-2008)
Gerhard Schröder (CDU), West German Federal Minister of the Interior (1953–1961), Federal Minister of Foreign Affairs (1961–1966), and Federal Minister of Defence (1966–1969), 1969 presidential candidate
Gustaf Algernon Stierneld, Swedish Prime Minister for Foreign Affairs (1838-1840; 1848–1856)
Péter Ungár, Member of the National Assembly of Hungary, Leader of LMP – Hungary's Green Party (2022-)
Jerzy Żyżyński, economist and member of the Polish Sejm

Middle East

Najah al-Attar, current Vice President of Syria
Mehmet Aydın, Turkish Minister of State (2002-)
Hovhannes Bujicanian, Armenian teacher in the Ottoman Empire
Saad bin Khalid Al Jabri, Saudi Arabian Minister of State
Abu Bakr al-Qirbi, Yemeni Minister of Foreign Affairs (2001-2014; 2016)
Bassam Talhouni, Jordanian Minister for Justice (2013-2016)
Hikmat Abu Zayd, first female cabinet minister of Egypt

Oceania

Richard Arthur, New South Wales Minister for Public Health (1927-1930)
Sir Thomas Brisbane, former Governor of New South Wales whose name gave rise to the Australian city, Brisbane
Sir John Bowser, 26th Premier of Victoria
Francis Bugotu, Permanent Representative of the Solomon Islands to the United Nations (1978-1992), Secretary-General of the Pacific Community (1982-1986)
Cyril Cameron, former Australian Senator for Tasmania
Sir Michael Cullen, former Deputy Prime Minister of New Zealand
Sir John Logan Campbell, 17th Mayor of Auckland
John Garland, New South Wales Minister for Justice (1909-1910; 1916–1919)
Sir James Graham, 41st Mayor of Sydney
John Alexander MacPherson, 7th Premier of Victoria
Malcolm Mackay, Australian Minister for the Navy (1971-1972)
Sir David Monro, 2nd Speaker of the New Zealand House of Representatives
F. Russell Miller, 40th Mayor of Invercargill, New Zealand
Sir William MacGregor, 11th Governor of Queensland
Andrew McLachlan, Australian Senator for South Australia, Deputy President of the Australian Senate (2022-)
Sir Hugh Nelson, 11th Premier of Queensland
David Seath, New Zealand Minister of Internal Affairs (1963-1972)
Carty Salmon, 2nd Speaker of the Australian House of Representatives
Sir Alexander Stuart, 9th Premier of New South Wales
Henry Thacker, 32nd Mayor of Christchurch, New Zealand

Royalty

Albert, 12th Prince of Thurn and Taxis, head of the House of Thurn and Taxis
Countess Alexandra Nikolaevna Tolstoy-Miloslavsky, member of the Tolstoy family
Archibald Campbell, 3rd Duke of Argyll
David Carnegie, 4th Duke of Fife
Charles Carnegie, Earl of Southesk, heir apparent to the Dukedom of Fife
Samuel Chatto and Arthur Chatto, sons of Elizabeth II's niece Lady Sarah Chatto
Edward VII, King of the United Kingdom and Emperor of India^[a]^[23]
George Percy, Earl Percy, heir apparent to the Dukedom of Northumberland
Henry FitzRoy, 12th Duke of Grafton, direct male-line descendant of Charles II of England
Lady Amelia Windsor, a relative of the British royal family
Margareta of Romania, Custodian of the Crown of Romania
Princess Mako of Akishino, member of the Imperial House of Japan
Princess Nora zu Oettingen–Spielberg, member of the House of Oettingen-Spielberg
Princess Raiyah bint Hussein, member of the House of Hashim
Princess Salha bint Asem, member of the House of Hashim
Princess Tsuguko of Takamado, member of the Imperial House of Japan
Prince Pavel Mikhailovich Dashkov, Russian aristocrat
Louis Spencer, Viscount Althorp, heir apparent to the Spencer earldom and first cousin of the Duke of Cambridge and Prince Harry
Bhagvat Singh, former Maharaja of the princely state of Gondal

Judges and lawyers

Lord Reed of Allermuir, President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom (2020-)
Lord Hodge, Deputy President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom (2020-)
Lord Carloway, Lord President of the Court of Session and Lord Justice General (2015-)
James Wolffe, Lord Advocate (2016-2021)
Julia Sebutinde, Judge of the International Court of Justice (2012-)

Henry Cockburn, Lord Cockburn, former Solicitor General for Scotland
William Cullen, Baron Cullen of Whitekirk, former Lord President of the Court of Session and Lord Justice General
James Clyde, Baron Clyde, former Lord of Appeal in Ordinary
Paul Cullen, Lord Pentland, sitting justice on the Supreme Courts of Scotland
Raymond Doherty, Lord Doherty, sitting justice on the Supreme Courts of Scotland
Unity Dow, former judge on the High Court of Botswana
Colin Sutherland, Lord Carloway, current Lord President of the Court of Session and Lord Justice General
Sir David Edward, former judge of the Court of Justice of the European Union
Thomas Addis Emmet, former New York State Attorney General
Ian Fraser, Baron Fraser of Tullybelton, former Lord of Appeal in Ordinary
John Garland, former Attorney General of New South Wales
Brian Gill, Lord Gill, former Lord President of the Court of Session
Patrick Hodge, Lord Hodge, current Deputy President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom
Arthur Hamilton, Lord Hamilton, former Lord President of the Court of Session and Lord Justice General
Henry Gollan, former Chief Justice of Hong Kong
David Hope, Baron Hope of Craighead, former Deputy President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom
James Shaw, Baron Kilbrandon, former Lord of Appeal in Ordinary
Robert Lyall-Grant, former Attorney General of Kenya
Nathaniel Lindley, Baron Lindley, former Lord of Appeal in Ordinary and Master of the Rolls
Frank Mulholland, Lord Mulholland, sitting justice on the Supreme Courts of Scotland
Duncan Menzies, Lord Menzies, sitting justice on the Supreme Courts of Scotland
Atholl MacGregor, former Chief Justice of Hong Kong
Alexander Mackenzie, barrister and writer on propaganda^[24]
Hugh Macmillan, Baron Macmillan, former Lord of Appeal in Ordinary
Wilfrid Normand, Baron Normand, former Lord of Appeal in Ordinary
Sir Alan Stewart Orr, former Lord Justice of Appeal^[25]
David Richard Pigot, former Attorney General for Ireland
Alipate Qetaki, former Attorney General of Fiji
Fred Ruhindi, former Attorney General of Uganda
Michael Ramodibedi, former Chief Justice of the High Court of Swaziland
Robert Reed, Baron Reed of Allermuir, current President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom
Anne Smith, Lady Smith, sitting justice on the Supreme Courts of Scotland
Alexander Shand, 1st Baron Shand, former Lord of Appeal in Ordinary
Alfred Henry Simpson, former Chief Justice of Kenya
Julia Sebutinde, sitting Judge on the International Court of Justice
Alexander Mackenzie Stuart, Baron Mackenzie-Stuart, former President of the European Court of Justice
James Beveridge Thomson, former Chief Justice of Malaysia

Military

Officers

Ralph Abercromby, MP, Commander-in-Chief, Ireland during the Irish Rebellion of 1798
Sir Archibald Alison, 2nd Baronet, General
Sir Hugh Beach, General, Deputy Commander-in-Chief Field Army (1976-1977)
Sir James Baird, Lieutenant General, Director General Army Medical Services (1973-1977)
David Coulter, Major-General, Chaplain General of the British Army (2014-2018)
Robert Craigie, Admiral
Thomas Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald , Naval flag officer during the Napoleonic Wars and later Admiral of the Red, dubbed by Napoleon as le Loup des Mers, 'the Sea Wolf'
Sir Hew Whitefoord Dalrymple, General, Governor of Gibraltar (1806-1808)
John Forbes, Brigadier-General, commanded the Forbes Expedition during the French-Indian war
Sir Alexander Hood, Lieutenant-General, Director General Army Medical Services (1941-1948), Governor of Bermuda (1949-1955)
John Hunter, Vice-admiral of the red, Governor of New South Wales (1795-1800)
James Francis Edward Keith, Scottish Jacobite, served during the Seven Years' War under Frederick the Great as Generalfeldmarschall of the Prussian Army
Daniel Knobel, Lieutenant General, Surgeon General of the South African Defence Force (1988-1997)
William Thompson Lusk, Assistant Adjutant-General for the Union, American Civil War
Sir James McGrigor, responsible for the creation of the Royal Army Medical Corps
Gregor MacGregor, Army General, adventurer, and confidence trickster, known for his "Poyois scheme"
Sir George Malcolm, General
Sir Harold Martin, Air Marshal, Commander-in-Chief RAF Germany (1970-1973)
Sir Ian McGeoch, Vice-Admiral
Iain McNicoll, Air Marshal, Deputy Commander-in-Chief Operations, RAF Air Command (2007-2010)
Sir Charles Napier, Admiral, served in War of 1812, the Napoleonic Wars, and the Crimean War
Sharon Nesmith, first woman to command a British Army Brigade, Lieutenant-general and Deputy Chief of the General Staff (2021-)
Arthur Edward Potts, Major General, Commander of 6th Canadian Infantry Division (1942-1943)
Philip Raffaelli , Surgeon-General of the United Kingdom Armed Forces (2009-2012)
Andrew Rutherford, 1st Earl of Teviot, Lieutenant-General under Louis XIV when England was in Interregnum, Governor of Tangier (1663-1664)
George Ramsay, 9th Earl of Dalhousie, Governor of Canada (1820-1828), Commander-in-Chief, India (1830-1832)
Thomas Rimmer, Air Vice-Marshal, Commander, British Forces Cyprus (2000-2003)
Alan Reay, Lieutenant General, Director General Army Medical Services (1981-1984)
Sir James Simpson, General, Commander-in-Chief British troops in the Crimea (1855)
James Stuart, General, 1st General Officer Commanding, Ceylon (1796)
Sir Charles Shaw, Brigadier-general during the Portuguese Liberal Wars
Adam Stephen, Scottish-American General in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War
Mona Chalmers Watson, head of Women's Army Auxiliary Corps
Bennett H. Young, Lieutenant, Confederate officer who led the St. Albans Raid during the American Civil War

Soldiers

Eric Brown, Royal Navy officer and test pilot who flew 487 types of aircraft, more than anyone else in history
William Brydon , the only person to reach safety in the 1842 retreat from Kabul
James Marr Brydone, Ship's surgeon of HMS Thunderer at Battle of Trafalgar
Charles Gray Catto, World War I flying ace, later Mayor of Waco, Texas
Gordon Duncan, Scottish flying ace
James Oliver Ewart, intelligence officer, translator, and staff member of Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery
John Todd, Scottish First World War flying ace credited with 18 aerial victories

Victoria Cross and George Cross Recipients

Recipients of the Victoria Cross:

Recipients of the George Cross:

Second World War

Natural sciences, engineering and medicine

Astronomy

Mary Brück, astronomer, astrophysicist and historian of science
Hermann Brück, astronomer
John Campbell Brown, astronomer
Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell, astrophysicist, co-discoverer of the first Pulsars, 2018 winner of Special Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics, Copley Medalist
Ralph Copeland, discoverer of the Copeland Septet
Sir Frank Watson Dyson, whose observations during Solar eclipse of May 29, 1919 played an important role in proving Einstein's theory of General relativity
James Dunlop, astronomer, Herschel Medal winner in 2016
James Gregory, discoverer of the infinite series and designer of the first practical reflecting telescope, the Gregorian telescope
Catherine Heymans, astrophysicist, incumbent Astronomer Royal for Scotland, Herschel Medal winner in 2022
Thomas Henderson, first to measure the distance between Earth to Alpha Centauri
Chris Impey, astronomer
James Lind of Windsor, natural philosopher
Malcolm Longair, physicist
Simon Lilly, astrophysicist, Herschel Medal winner in 2017
William McCrea, astronomer
John A. Peacock, astronomer, Shaw Prize laureate in 2014^[26]
Anneila Sargent, astronomer
Charles Piazzi Smyth, astronomer
Licia Verde, cosmologist, 2018 winner of Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics

Chemistry

Thomas Anderson, discoverer of pyridine
Polly Arnold, director of the chemical sciences division at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Paul Attfield, Professor of Materials Science
George Barger, chemist
Joseph Black, discoverer of Magnesium, carbon dioxide, latent heat and specific heat
Wendy Bickmore, chemist
Heinz Fraenkel-Conrat, biochemist
Leroy Cronin, chemist
Lorenz Florenz Friedrich von Crell, German chemist
Robin Ferrier, discoverer of Ferrier rearrangement and Ferrier carbocyclization
Eleanor Campbell, Professor of Physical Chemistry
Neil Campbell, chemist and amateur athlete
Archibald Scott Couper, proposed an early theory of chemical structure and bonding
John Davy, discoverer of phosgene
Sir James Dewar, inventor of the Dewar flask
Thomas Graham, formulater of Graham's law and inventor of Dialysis
Frederick Guthrie, synthesizer of Mustard gas
Narayan Hosmane, cancer researcher, BNCT
Edmund Hirst, chemist
William Henry, formulater of Henry's law
Thomas Charles Hope, discoverer of Strontium
Richard Henderson, pioneer in the field of electron microscopy, Nobel laureates in Chemistry in 2017
David Leigh, Forbes Chair of Organic Chemistry at the University of Edinburgh from 2001 to 2012, Feynman Prize in Nanotechnology winner in 2007
Guy Lloyd-Jones, Forbes Chair of Organic Chemistry at the University of Edinburgh (2012–)
Francis Robert Japp, discoverer of Japp-Klingemann reaction
Christina Miller, synthesized phosphorus trioxide
Peter D. Mitchell, discoverer of the chemiosmotic mechanism of ATP synthesis, Nobel laureates in Chemistry in 1978
Charles Macintosh, chemist, inventor of the waterproof raincoat (Mackintosh)
Sir Geoff Palmer, Jamaican-born scientist, brewing researcher and activist, first black professor in Scotland
William Prout, proposer of Prout's hypothesis, an early model of Proton
Sir Dai Rees, CEO of the Medical Research Council from 1987 to 1996
Prafulla Chandra Roy, distinguished chemist and founder of Bengal Chemicals & Pharmaceuticals
Daniel Rutherford, discoverer of Nitrogen
Sir James Fraser Stoddart, supramolecular chemist, Nobel laureates in Chemistry in 2016
Benjamin Silliman, American chemist
Smithson Tennant, discoverer of Iridium and Osmium
Alexander Robertus Todd, Baron Todd, first synthesizer of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) and flavin adenine dinucleotide (FAD), Nobel laureates in Chemistry in 1957
Vincent du Vigneaud, first synthesizer of Oxytocin and Vasopressin, Nobel laureates in Chemistry in 1955
James Walker, chemist
Kurt Wüthrich, developer of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) methods for studying biological macromolecules, Nobel laureates in Chemistry in 2002
Lesley Yellowlees, first female president of the Royal Society of Chemistry

Geology

Robert Bell, geologist
Ami Boué, first to produce a Geological map of the world, Wollaston Medalist
Sir John William Dawson, geologist
James David Forbes, inventor of the Seismometer
Hugh Falconer, geologist and paleontologist, Wollaston Medalist
John Flett, geologist, Wollaston Medalist
Sir Archibald Geikie, geologist, Wollaston Medalist
Sir James Hector, geologist
Arthur Holmes, geologist, Wollaston Medalist
Wilfred Hudleston Hudleston, geologist, Wollaston Medalist
James Hutton, father of modern geology
Rosemary Hutton, geophysicist and pioneer of magnetotellurics
Robert Jameson, naturalist and mineralist
Sir William Edmond Logan, geologist, founder and first director of the Geological Survey of Canada, Wollaston Medalist
Sir Roderick Murchison, geologist, known for first describing the Silurian, Devonian and Permian systems, Copley Medalist
William Nicol, inventor of Nicol prism
Robert Cameron Mackenzie, geologist
Stan Paterson, glaciologist
Anya Reading, geophysicist
Justin B. Ries, American biogeochemist and inventor known for discoveries in the field of global oceanic change
Frederick Stewart, geologist
Erskine Douglas Williamson, known for his contribution to the Adams–Williamson equation

Computer Science and Informatics

Senior Academic Staff

Former Staff and Alumni

Geoffrey Hinton, "Godfather of Deep learning and Artificial neural network", 2018 winner of the Turing Award^[27]
Robin Milner (1934–2010), computer scientist, developer of ML, π-calculus and LCF, winner of the Turing Award in 1991
Leslie Valiant, Complexity theory pioneer, winner of the Turing Award in 2010
Samson Abramsky, computer scientist at the University of Oxford
Pat Ambler, creator of Freddy II
Joe Armstrong, creator of Erlang programming language and Open Telecom Platform (OTP)
Andrew Blake, computer scientist and former director of Microsoft Research, Cambridge and Alan Turing Institute in London
Bob Boyer, computer scientist, mathematician, philosopher at the University of Texas at Austin
Alan W. Black, Professor at the Language Technologies Institute, Carnegie Mellon University
Justine Cassell, Professor at the Human–Computer Interaction Institute, Carnegie Mellon University
Luca Cardelli, computer scientist, Assistant Director of Microsoft Research, Cambridge
Ian Clarke, creator of Freenet
Rosemary Candlin, crystallographer and computer scientist at CERN
Margarita Chli, Leader of the Vision for Robotics Lab at ETH Zürich
Peter Dayan, director at the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics in Tübingen, Germany
John Darlington, Emeritus Professor, Imperial College London
Bruce Davie, CTO of VMware
Paul Dourish, Professor at the University of California, Irvine
Carla Gomes, computer scientist, Founding Director of the Cornell University Institute for Computational Sustainability
Leslie Ann Goldberg, computer scientist at the University of Oxford
Jeremy Gibbons, Professor of computing, University of Oxford
Andrew Gordon at Microsoft Research
Michael J. C. Gordon (1948–2017), computer scientist at the University of Cambridge
Alex Graves, computer scientist at Google DeepMind, creator of Neural Turing machine (NTM)
Philippa Gardner, Professor of Theoretical Computer Science at Imperial College London
Richard Gregory (1923–2010), cognitive scientist at the University of Bristol
Pat Hayes, Senior Research Scientist at the Institute for Human and Machine Cognition in Pensacola, Florida
Robert Harper (computer scientist), Professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University
Matthew Hennessy, Co-creator of Hennessy–Milner logic
Xuedong Huang, CTO of Microsoft Azure AI
Auke Ijspeert, Head of the Biorobotics Laboratory at EPFL
Mark H. Johnson, cognitive neuroscientist and Brain–computer interface researcher, Head of the Department of Psychology at the University of Cambridge
Mark Jerrum, Professor of Pure mathematics at the University of London, Gödel Prize Laureate
Philipp Koehn, Professor of Machine Translation at Johns Hopkins University
Robert Kowalski, logician whose interpretation of the Horn clause at Edinburgh became instrumental in the creation of Prolog
Lǐ Wèi, mathematician and computer scientist, President of Beihang University
Christopher Longuet-Higgins (1923–2004), cognitive scientist
Donald Michie, founder of Artificial Intelligence in the UK
Eugenio Moggi, first to explicitly link the Monad of category theory to functional programming
J Strother Moore, computer scientist at the University of Texas at Austin, co-developer of the Boyer–Moore string-search algorithm and the Boyer–Moore majority vote algorithm
Stephen Muggleton, Head of the Computational Bioinformatics Laboratory at Imperial College London
Alan Mycroft, Professor at the Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge
Timothy O'Shea, Emeritus Professor and former principal and vice-chancellor of the University of Edinburgh
Robin Popplestone (1938–2004), creator of COWSEL and POP-2
Martha Palmer, creator of PropBank and VerbNet
Benjamin C. Pierce, Henry Salvatori Professor of computer science at the University of Pennsylvania
John C. Reynolds (1935–2013), inventor of System F and professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University
Davide Sangiorgi, Professor at the University of Bologna
Nigel Shadbolt,^[28] Chairman of the Open Data Institute (ODI) and master of Jesus College, Oxford
Alistair Sinclair, Professor at University of California, Berkeley, Gödel Prize Laureate
Aaron Sloman, philosopher, cognitive scientist at the University of Birmingham
Stephen Tweedie, software developer, creator of ext3 file system
Chris Tofts, scientist at Hewlett-Packard
Mads Tofte, professor at the IT University of Copenhagen
Lincoln Wallen, CTO of Improbable, former CTO of DreamWorks Animation
Toby Walsh, Professor of artificial intelligence at the UNSW
Hanna Wallach at Microsoft Research
David H. D. Warren, creator of the Warren Abstract Machine
Xia Peisu, "Mother of Computer Science in China"
Andrew Zisserman, computer scientist at Google DeepMind and University of Oxford

Engineering

Sir Thomas Hudson Beare, engineer
George Thomas Beilby, chemical engineer
Alexander Graham Bell, engineer, inventor of the telephone and founder of AT&T
Isaac Lowthian Bell, metallurgist, businessman and politician
George Parker Bidder, engineer and calculating prodigy
James Blyth, electrical engineer, pioneer of the Wind Turbine
William Fothergill Cooke, engineer, founder of Electric Telegraph Company
Lewis Gordon, civil engineer^[29]
Harald Haas, inventor of Li-Fi
James Jardine, civil engineer
Fleeming Jenkin, engineer, inventor of telpherage
Alexander Carnegie Kirk, marine engineer
Elijah McCoy, engineer, inventor of the Automatic lubricator for Steam Engines
James Newlands, civil engineer
John Scott Russell, civil engineer, discoverer of Soliton
John Randall, inventor of Cavity Magnetron and leader of the team that led to the discovery of structure of DNA
John Rennie the Elder, civil engineer^[30]
George Rennie, engineer
Stephen Salter MBE FRSE, wave energy pioneer
Robert Stephenson, railway engineer
Robert Stevenson, civil engineer
Alan Stevenson, lighthouse engineer
David Stevenson, lighthouse designer
Thomas Stevenson, lighthouse engineer
Charles Alexander Stevenson, lighthouse engineer
David Alan Stevenson, lighthouse engineer
Robert Stirling, inventor of Stirling engine
John Shepherd-Barron, inventor of the automated teller machine (ATM)
William Symington, engineer and inventor
Maria Watkins (née Marja Ludwika Ziff) first woman to study electrical engineering there, president of the Women's Engineering Society

Mathematics and Physics

Alexander Aitken, mathematician, worked in Hut 6 Bletchley Park decrypting the ENIGMA code, known for the Aitken's delta-squared process
Sir Michael Atiyah mathematician, Fields Medallist in 1966, Abel Prize winner 2004
Charles Glover Barkla, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1917 for his work in X-ray spectroscopy and related areas in the study of X-rays
Thomas Bayes, mathematician, known for Bayes' theorem and Bayesian Statistics
Max Born, principle founder of Quantum mechanics and Nobel laureate in Physics in 1954
Sir John M. Ball, mathematician
Sir David Brewster, physicist, discoverer of Brewster's angle and photoelasticity, inventor of Kaleidoscope
J. W. S. Cassels, mathematician
Michael Cates, physicist known for his work in soft matter
George Chrystal, mathematician
Cheng Kaijia, physicist and pioneer of nuclear technology in China
Roger Cowley, physicist
Janette Dunlop, physicist and teacher
Sir Charles Galton Darwin, director of the National Physics Laboratory (NPL) during World War II
Sir James Alfred Ewing, physicist and engineer, discoverer of Hysteresis
Klaus Fuchs, theoretical physicist and atomic spy^[31]
Norman Feather, physicist
David Gregory, mathematician, early Newtonian
Marion Cameron Gray, mathematician^[32]
Fabiola Gianotti, Director-general of CERN, 2013 winner of Special Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics
Peter Higgs, 2013 Nobel laureate in Physics, theoretical physicist, Emeritus Professor, and theorist of the Higgs Boson, Higgs Mechanism and Higgs Field
Sir W. V. D. Hodge, mathematician and Copley Medalist, formulator of the Hodge theory and Hodge conjecture, one of the seven Millennium Prize Problems
Huang Kun, physicist, co-formulator of the Born-Huang approximation
Charles Hutton, mathematician and Copley Medalist
James Ivory, mathematician and Copley Medalist
Philip Kelland, mathematician
Tom W. B. Kibble, theoretical physicist, Sakurai Prize winner in 2010
Nicholas Kemmer, contributor in United Kingdom's nuclear programme
Sir John Leslie, mathematician and physicist, the first producer of artificial ice
Terry Lyons, mathematician
Dusa McDuff, mathematician
Colin Maclaurin, mathematician, discoverer of MacLaurin series
James Clerk Maxwell, physicist, "father of electromagnetism and Statistical mechanics"
David Olive, theoretical physicist and string theorist, 1997 Dirac Medal and Prize winner
Sir Alexander Oppenheim, mathematician
John Playfair, mathematician
John Polkinghorne, theoretical physicist and theologian, Templeton Prize winner in 2002
Peng Huanwu, physicist and pioneer of nuclear technology in China
William John Macquorn Rankine, engineer, physicist, and early contributor to the development of thermodynamics
Sir Joseph Rotblat, Polish physicist who worked in the Manhattan Project, 1995 Nobel Laureate in Peace
John Robison, physicist
Marion Ross, physicist
Agata Smoktunowicz, mathematician
Igor Tamm, theorizer of Phonon and designer of Tomahak, won the 1958 Nobel Prize in Physics for discovering the Cherenkov radiation
Peter Guthrie Tait, physicist and pioneer in Thermodynamics
Neil Turok, theoretical physicist, Director of the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics (2009-2019)
Sheila Tinney, mathematical physicist^[33]
Joseph Wedderburn, mathematician
Emil Wolf, physicist, one-half of Born and Wolf
Sir Edmund Whittaker, mathematician and historian of science, Copley Medalist
Arthur Geoffrey Walker, mathematician, known for co-developing the Friedmann–Lemaître–Robertson–Walker metric and Fermi–Walker differentiation
Shu Xingbei, physicist
Thomas Young, polymath, established the wave theory of light through his double-slit experiment

Medicine and biology

Thomas Addis, pioneer in nephrology
Thomas Addison, first described Addison's disease, pernicious anemia and Addison-Schilder syndrome
William John Adie, first described Adie syndrome and narcolepsy
Arthur Cecil Alport, first identifier of the Alport Syndrome
Kenneth Baillie, intensive care physician
Alfred George Barrs, physician
Nick Barton, evolutionary biologist, winner of the Darwin–Wallace Medal in 2008
Sir David Baulcombe, plant scientist, discovered SiRNA and its role in gene silencing in plants, winner of the Lasker Award in 2008
Sir John Beddington, population biologist, UK Government Chief Scientific Adviser
Charles Bell, anatomist and surgeon, first described of Bell's palsy
Joseph Bell, surgeon
Stephen L. Brusatte, paleontologist and evolutionary biologist
Seneka Bibile, influential Sri Lankan pharmacologist
Sir Adrian Bird, geneticist, discovered the protein MeCP2 involved in DNA methylation, Canada Gairdner International Award winner in 2011, Shaw Prize laureate in 2016
James Braid, surgeon, founder of hypnosis in medicine
Robert Brown, botanist, discoverer of Brownian Motion
Benjamin Smith Barton, botanist
William Speirs Bruce, naturalist and oceanographer, led the Scottish National Antarctic Expedition in 1902-04^[34]
William Budd, physician and epidemiologist^[35]
John Hutton Balfour, botanist
David Bruce, discoverer of Brucella
Min Chueh Chang, inventor of Combined oral contraceptive pill and pioneer in IVF, Lasker Award winner in 1954
Keith Campbell, biologist, Shaw Prize laureate in 2008
John Murray Carnochan, neurosurgeon, performed first successful surgery for trigeminal neuralgia
Bryan Clarke, geneticist, winner of the Darwin–Wallace Medal in 2008
Brian Charlesworth, evolutionary biologist, winner of the Darwin–Wallace Medal in 2010
Virender Lal Chopra, geneticist and biotechnologist
Robin Coombs, immunologist, discoverer of the Coombs test
John G. S. Coghill, doctor
Richard A Collins, biochemist and author
Hilary Critchley, obstetrician and gynaecologist
William Cullen, physician and professor of medicine
Rafael Antonio Curra, Venezuelan ichthyologist
Charles Darwin, naturalist, author of The Origin of Species
James Douglas, physician and anatomist; the Douglas pouch and Douglas line are named for him
Cuthbert Dukes, pathologist and author
Richard Eastell, professor of bone medicine
Robert Edwards, pioneer in IVF, 2010 winner of Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
John Elliotson, physician, mesmerist
James Esdaile, surgeon, mesmerist
Emmanuel Evans-Anfom, Ghanaian doctor and vice-chancellor of Kwame Nkrumah University
Ronald Fairbairn, psychiatrist and psychoanalyst^[36]
Sir David Ferrier, neuroscientist
Heather M. Ferguson, FRSE malaria vector biologist^[37]
Charles ffrench-Constant, neurologist
Ronald Fairbairn, psychiatrist, known for his Object Relations Theory
Wong Fun, first western-educated Chinese doctor
Ian Frazer, immunologist, developer of the HPV vaccine
Dame Anne Glover FRS, Chief Scientific Adviser to the President of the European Commission from 2012 to 2014
Rosemary Grant, evolutionary biologist, 2009 winner of Darwin-Wallace Medal
Michael Grunstein, biochemist, 2018 winner of Lasker Award
John Haldane, physiologist
William Hewson, founder of haematology, Copley Medalist
Bill Hill OBE FRS FRSE, geneticist and statistician, winner of 2018 Darwin Medal
William Hunter, anatomist
Thomas Hodgkin, physician, first describer of Hodgkin's lymphoma
James Africanus Beale Horton, medicine
David Hosack, American botanist and landscape architect^[38]
Sophia Jex-Blake, leader of the Edinburgh Seven, pioneer of medical education for women in Britain
Steve Jones, geneticist
Kurt Koffka, psychologist, founder of Gestalt Psychology
George Kelly, psychologist
Sir John Liddell, physician and director-general of the Medical Department of the Royal Navy
James Lind (naturalist), physician to George III
James Lind, pioneer in preventive medicine, theorized the cure for scurvy
Joseph Lister, 1st Baron Lister, introduced antiseptics into surgery
Winifred W. Logan, nurse theorist
Mary F. Lyon, discoverer of Lyonization, winner of 1997 Wolf Prize in Medicine
John Claudius Loudon, botanist
Ian MacDonald, physician
Hermann Joseph Muller, 1946 winner of Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discoveries in Mutagenesis
William Sutherland Macdonald, physician and soldier
George Mackay (Ophthalmologic Surgeon)
Trudy Mackay, quantitative geneticist, winner of the Wolf Prize in Agriculture in 2016^[39]
William Alexander Mackay, doctor
Aubrey Manning, zoologist
James Fitzgerald Martin, personal surgeon to George VI and Lord Mountbatten
May-Britt Moser, 2014 winner of Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for her discoveries in Grid Cell
Edvard Moser, 2014 winner of Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discoveries in Grid Cell
Samuel Manuwa, Nigerian doctor and president of the World Federation for Mental Health
Henry Johnston Scott Matthew, physician, toxicologist
Kath M. Melia, sociologist, professor of nursing, champion of ethics in healthcare
Kirsten McCaffery, public health researcher
Roger McNeil, doctor of public health
Gilean McVean, post-doctoral fellow, evolutionary biologist, member of the steering committee for the 1000 Genomes Project
Pleasantine Mill, cell biologist
B. K. Misra, neurosurgeon
Dame Anne McLaren, developmental biologist
John Keith Moffat - Guggenheim Fellow, biologist and former Deputy Provost at University of Chicago, noted for Advanced Photon Source and Time resolved crystallography
Alexander Monro (primus), (secundus) and (tertius), anatomists
Sir Paul Nurse, geneticist, 2001 Winner of Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
Kim Nasmyth, geneticist, 2018 winner of Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences
Susan Ofori-Atta, first Ghanaian woman doctor
Sarah Otto, theoretical biologist, 2021 winner of Darwin-Wallace Medal
Richard Owen, major opponent to Charles Darwin, known for coining the term Dinosauria and presenting them as a distinct taxonomic group
Josephine Pemberton, evolutionary biologist, 2018 winner of Darwin-Wallace Medal
George Alexander Pirie, doctor
William Roxburgh, botanist
Richard Frank Rand, surgeon
David Robertson (virologist), virologist and bioinformatician
John Rogerson, personal physician to Catherine the Great
Nancy Roper, nurse theorist
Fiona Ross, nursing scholar
Michael Rosbash, 2017 winner of Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
Agnes Yewande Savage, first West African woman graduate and doctor
Richard Gabriel Akinwande Savage, doctor and soldier
Edward Albert Sharpey-Schafer, physiologist and neuroscientist, founder of Endocrinology, Copley Medalist
Robert Sibbald, Professor of Medicine
James Edward Smith, founder of the Linnean Society
Randy Schekman, former editor-in-chief of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) and 2013 winner of Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
Sir James Young Simpson, pioneered the use of chloroform in midwifery
Leslie Skene, psychiatrist^[40]
Sahib Singh Sokhey, biochemist and British Indian Army general^[41]
Jeremy Smith, biological scientist
Jotello Festiri Soga, South Africa's first black veterinarian
Sir Edwin Southern, biomedical scientist, invented Southern blot, Canada Gairdner International Award winner in 1990, Lasker Award winner in 2005
Tara Spires-Jones, neuroscientist
George Neil Stewart, physiologist
Anne Bryson Sutherland, plastic surgeon
Grant Robert Sutherland , human geneticist
Alison J. Tierney, professor of nursing, nurse theorist
D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson, biologist, pioneer in Mathematical biology
William Aldren Turner, neurologist
Meena Upadhyaya, medical geneticist
Colin S. Valentine, medical missionary
John Walker, naturalist
Joanna Wardlaw, neuroradiology and neuroimaging
Herbert Furnivall Waterhouse, surgeon and lecturer in anatomy
Hamish Watson, cardiology
Robert Whytt, medicine
Sir Ian Wilmut, embryologist and former supervisor of the team that cloned Dolly the Sheep, Shaw Prize laureate in 2008
C. H. Waddington, eminent developmental biologist
Nairn Wilson, dental surgeon
Samuel Alexander Kinnier Wilson, first describer of Wilson's Disease
William Withering, physician, discoverer of Digitalis
Robert Willan, founder of Dermatology
Asrat Woldeyes, Ethiopian surgeon and politician
Robert Ramsay Wright, biologist, helped to re-establish the University of Toronto Faculty of Medicine in 1887
Ruth Wynne-Davies doctor and expert on scoliosis and clubfoot
Charles Wyville Thomson, naturalist and chief scientist on the Challenger expedition
Yao Zhen, biologist
Zhong Nanshan, pulmonologist, discoverer of the SARS Coronavirus and former president of the Chinese Medical Association

Social sciences, arts and business

Pulitzer Prize

Ross Anderson, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting in 1990^[42]
Garry Wills, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction in 1993
Jack N. Rakove, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1997
Andrew Marshall, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting in 2014

Architecture

Robert Adam, architect
Suad Amiry, Palestinian architect
Sir Robert Rowand Anderson, architect
Denise Bennetts, co-founder of Bennetts Associates
Colen Campbell, architect and architectural writer
Theodore S. Clerk, Ghanaian architect
Ted Cullinan, architect
Ptolemy Dean, architect, 19th and current Surveyor of the Fabric of Westminster Abbey
Sir James Dunbar-Nasmith, conservation architect and former head of the Department of Architecture (1978–1988)
William Nairn Forbes, architect
Malcolm Fraser, architect
Sir Nicholas Grimshaw, architect of Waterloo International railway station and the Eden Project, former president of the Royal Academy
Abdur Rahman Hye, architect
Percy Johnson-Marshall, urban designer
Sir William Kininmonth, architect
Tony Kettle, architect, designer of the Falkirk Wheel
Sir Robert Lorimer, architect and furniture designer
John McAslan, architect of Western concourse, King's Cross station
Sir Robert Matthew, architect
Ebenezer James MacRae, architect
Anuradha Mathur, landscape architect
Richard Murphy, architect
Kate Macintosh, architect
Harriet Pattison, landscape architect
Patrick Nuttgens, architect and academic
William Henry Playfair, architect
Deborah Saunt, architect
Deyan Sudjic, architecture critic
Frank Worthington Simon, architect
Sir Basil Spence, Brutalist architect
Deborah Saunt, co-founder of Deborah Saunt David Hills Architects (DSDHA)
William Thornton, architect who designed the United States Capitol

Business

John Allan, Chairman of Tesco and Barratt Developments
Laura J. Alber, CEO of Williams-Sonoma Inc
William Denholm Barnetson, Chairman of United Newspapers, Reuters and Thames Television
Henry Birch, CEO of The Very Group
James Blair-Cunynghame, former Chairman of the Royal Bank of Scotland
Ian Bankier, Chairman of Celtic F.C.
Jo Bamford, multi-billionaire businessman, founder of investment firm HYCAP
Chris Beard, former CEO of Mozilla
Crawford W. Beveridge, former Executive Vice President, Sun Microsystems
Jamie Byng, CEO of Canongate Books
Victoria Barnsley, former CEO of HarperCollins
Adam Black, founder of book publishing company A & C Black
Sir Donald Brydon, Chairman of the Royal Mail, Sage Group and Medical Research Council
Nigel Cowie, CEO of Daedong Credit Bank
Martin Dickie, co-founder of BrewDog
James Douglas, mining engineer, first President and CEO of Phelps Dodge
George A. David, Chairman Emeritus of Coca-Cola Hellenic Bottling Company
Bob Davies, former CEO of transport company Arriva
John Boyd Dunlop, founder of Dunlop Tyres
Eilidh Mactaggart, CEO of Scottish National Investment Bank
Birna Einarsdóttir, CEO of Íslandsbanki
Stephen Fitzpatrick, founder and CEO of OVO Energy and Vertical Aerospace, former owner of the Manor Racing team
Nicholas Ferguson, Chairman of Sky UK
John Ritchie Findlay, owner of The Scotsman newspaper
Robert A. Funk, former Chair of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City
Sandy Flockhart, former CEO of HSBC
Carlyle Gifford, Co-founder of investment firm Baillie Gifford
Doug Gurr, former global vice-president and head of Amazon UK
Hugh Grant, Chairman, President and CEO of Monsanto
Sir Alistair Grant, former Governor of Bank of Scotland
Johnny Hornby, Chairman of Sentebale
Alexander S. Hoare, former CEO of private bank C. Hoare & Co
Rick Hayward, former Chairman of Wolverhampton Wanderers F.C.
Andrew Harrison, CEO of Diamond Light Source
Ian Quayle Jones, co-founder, former chairman, and CEO of Quayle Munro merchant bank
Tony Hayward, Chairman of Glencore, former CEO of BP
Sir John Jennings, former Chairman of Shell
Alan Jope, CEO of Unilever
Jay Jopling, art dealer, founder of White Cube
William Jardine, merchant, surgeon, and co-founder of global conglomerate Jardine Matheson (怡和洋行)
Vivien Kellems, American industrialist and inventor^[43]
Robert Kibaara, CEO of Housing Finance Group of Kenya
Brittany Kaiser, former business development director for Cambridge Analytica
Christopher Lovelock, business school professor and services marketing pioneer
Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi, founder and CEO of Banda Property, husband to Princess Beatrice
Isabel Maxwell, co-founder of Excite
David Milne, co-founder and former CEO of Wolfson Microelectronics
Sir James Matheson, co-founder of Jardine Matheson
Alfred Mond, 1st Baron Melchett, founder and first CEO of Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI)
John McFarlane, Chairman of Westpac, former chairman of Barclays and Aviva
Sir Kenneth Murray, founder of multinational biotechnology company Biogen
Sir Frederick Ogilvie, former Director-General of the BBC
Lord Max Percy, financial analyst
David E. I. Pyott, former CEO of Allergan
Jim Reid, co-founder of Wolfson Microelectronics
Lars Rasmussen, co-founder of Google Maps
Anne Richards, CEO of Fidelity International
Nigel Stein, CEO of GKN
Sir Jack Shaw, former Governor of Bank of Scotland
Dave Stevenson, chairman of Edinburgh Woollen Mill
Lord Swann, former Chairman of the BBC
Paul Tash, chairman and CEO of the Times Publishing Company
Xenia Timchenko, daughter of Russian billionaire Gennady Timchenko^[44]
George Touche, co-founder of Deloitte
David Taylor, former General Secretary of UEFA
Sir David Tweedie, Chairman of the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB)
Susie Wolff, retired racing driver and CEO of Venturi Racing
Andrew Wirth, president and CEO of Squaw Valley Ski Holdings
James Watt, founder and CEO of BrewDog
Arthur Young, founder of Ernst & Young

Economics

Kenneth E. Boulding, American economist, recipient of the John Bates Clark Medal in 1949^[45]
Robin Burgess, economist
Thomas Chalmers, political economist
Paul Cockshott, Marxist economist
William Cunningham, economic historian
Marcus Fleming, known for his contribution to the Mundell–Fleming model
Sir Alexander Gray, Scottish economist and poet
William Ballantyne Hodgson, Scottish political economist
Sir John Kay, British economist, first Dean of Saïd Business School, University of Oxford
Sir James Mirrlees, British economist, winner of Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1996^[46]
John Moore, British economist, former president of the Econometric Society; recipient of the Yrjö Jahnsson Award in 1999, BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Awards laureate in 2020^[47]
John Ramsay McCulloch, Ricardian economist
Henry Dunning Macleod, coined the term "Gresham's law"
Takeshi Nakano, Japanese economist and bureaucrat, introduced the Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) to Japan
Joseph Shield Nicholson, English economist
Ragnar Nurkse, Estonian economist, known for his balanced growth theory
Sir Alan T. Peacock, English economist
Madsen Pirie, co-founder and president of the Adam Smith Institute
Will Page, Chief Economist at Spotify
John Rae, Scottish-Canadian economist
Gavin Clydesdale Reid, Scottish economist
James Steuart, economist
Yongcheol Shin, South Korean-born British economist
Adam Smith, author of The Wealth of Nations, Father of Economics
Jerzy Żyżyński, Polish economist

Literature

Michael Arlen, British-Armenian essayist
John Arden, playwright
William Archer, writer and critic
Jokha Alharthi, novelist, 2019 winner of International Booker Prize
Edward Abbey, American author
Sir J. M. Barrie, author of Peter Pan
James Boswell, life-long friend of Samuel Johnson, founded the modern biographic writing with his Life of Johnson
George Mackay Brown, poet
Horatius Bonar, Scottish churchman and poet
Thomas Carlyle, essayist and historian known for his great man theory
Bliss Carman, Canadian poet
Thomas Campbell, poet
S. R. Crockett, novelist
George Chalmers, antiquarian and political writer
Charles Cumming, spy fiction writer
Bruce Chatwin, travel writer, author and winner of the 1982 James Tait Black Memorial Prize
Jenny Colgan, romantic novelist
Kate Clanchy, poet and freelance writer
John Campbell, biographer
David Daiches, literary historian and critic
Erasmus Darwin, poet, writer and natural philosopher
William Drummond of Hawthornden, poet
Thomas Dick, writer
John Davison, poet
Angus Donald, author and journalist
Helen Dale, writer
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, author and creator of Sherlock Holmes
Barbara Erskine, novelist
Ralph Erskine, poet and churchman
John Fowles, novelist, author of The Collector and The French Lieutenant's Woman
Ahmed Fagih, Libyan novelist and diplomat
Robert Garioch, poet and translator
Oliver Goldsmith, writer, poet, and author of The Vicar of Wakefield
Miriam Gamble, poet
Michael Grant, writer and historian
Philippa Gregory, historical novelist, author of The Other Boleyn Girl
Ella Hickson, award-winning playwright
John Hodge, screenwriter
Thomas Hodgskin, socialist writer
John Home, playwright and joint-founder of the Royal Society of Edinburgh
Sam Holcroft, playwright
Hamish Henderson, Scottish poet
Africanus Horton, first West African graduate of Edinburgh, nationalist writer, and medical surgeon
Gu Hongming, writer and polyglot
Harold Jenkins, Shakespeare scholar
Kathleen Jamie, current Makar for Scotland
Lucy Kirkwood, playwright
Paul Alfred Kleinert, German writer, editor and translator
Ae-ran Kim, South Korean writer
Andrew Lownie, biographer
John Gibson Lockhart, biographer of Sir Walter Scott
Christine De Luca, poet
Sorley MacLean (Somhairle MacGill-Eain), Gaelic poet, nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1994
Joel McIver, author
Hugh MacDiarmid, Scottish poet and essayist
William Matheson (1910–1995), Scottish Gaelic scholar and ordained minister of the Church of Scotland^[48]
Norman MacCaig, Scottish poet
Samuel George Morton, writer and physician, proponent of Polygenism
Ian Maclaren, fiction writer and minister of the Free Church of Scotland
Sharman Macdonald, playwright
C. K. Scott Moncrieff, writer and translator
James Macpherson, poet, collector and publisher of The Poems of Ossian
Flora Nwapa, Nigerian author, educator and politician
Kole Omotosho, Nigerian writer
Julie O'Neill, author
Lloyd Osbourne, novelist
David Paulides, writer
Neil Paterson, Academy award-winning playwright and screenwriter
Themo H. Peel, author and illustrator
John William Polidori, personal physician to Lord Byron and author of The Vampyre, the first modern vampire story
Kenneth Ramchand, Trinidadian author and literary scholar
Sir Ian Rankin, author of the Inspector Rebus series and winner of the 2003 Edgar Awards
Peter Mark Roget, author of the first Thesaurus
J. K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter Series^[b]^[49]
Rachel Shabi, political author
George Saintsbury, literary critic
Tobias Smollett, poet and novelist
A. J. M. Smith, Canadian poet
Samuel Smiles, author and reformer
Sir Walter Scott, romanticist, author of Ivanhoe and Waverly, and founder of the Historical Novel genre
Ansuyah Ratipul Singh, South African author and doctor
Alexander McCall Smith, author of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series and professor of medical law
William Soutar, poet and diarist^[50]
Robert Louis Stevenson, author of Treasure Island and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
James Thomson, poet and playwright, known for the lyrics of Rule, Britannia!
Aeneas Francon Williams, writer, poet, and missionary
Kenneth White, poet
John Wilson, writer
Alan Warner, novelist
Catherynne M. Valente, American fiction writer, three-time Locus Award winner

Media and the arts

Jane Alexander, two time Primetime Emmy Award winner, Tony Award winner
Camilla Arfwedson, actress
Richard Arnold, presenter and journalist best known for his work on GMTV
Maria Bamford, comedian
Mardi Barrie, artist
Mitch Benn, comedian, songwriter and broadcaster
Elizabeth Blackadder, artist
Phyllis Bone, sculptor^[51]
Michael Boyd, artistic director of the Royal Shakespeare Company
Tom Bradby, journalist and novelist
JJ Chalmers, former Marine and television presenter
Ian Charleson, actor
Rawdon Christie, Television New Zealand producer/presenter
Hamish Clark, actor
Robbie Coltrane, actor, as Rubeus Hagrid in Harry Potter
Quentin Cooper, science journalist and broadcaster
Sophie Cookson, actress
Michael Davies, executive producer of Jeopardy!
Anthony d'Offay, art dealer
Daisy Donovan, actor and broadcaster
Rona Dougall, broadcaster, journalist and presenter (Scotland Tonight)
Elize du Toit, actress
Jimmy Finlayson, actor and comedian
Iain Gale, journalist and author
Jessica Harrison-Hall, British Museum curator
Jim Haynes, founder of Traverse Theatre, the paper International Times and the London Arts Lab
Carl Honoré, Canadian journalist
Mairi Hedderwick, illustrator and author
Robert Indiana, pop artist
Miles Jupp, comedian
Alex Kay-Jelski, journalist, editor of The Athletic
Roisin Kennedy, art critic and curator
Humphrey Ker, actor and comedian
Laura Kuenssberg, editor, BBC Politics
Paul Laidlaw, auctioneer and television antiques expert
Allan Little, BBC Foreign Correspondent
Donald Locke, Guyanese artist and curator
Angus Macfadyen, actor, as Robert the Bruce in Braveheart
Ewen MacIntosh, actor, The Office, Little Britain
Sally Magnusson, BBC journalist
Patrick Malahide, actor
Sam McAlister, TV producer and author
Kirsty McCabe, GMTV weather presenter
Kevin McKidd, actor, as Owen Hunt in Grey's Anatomy
Freddy McConnell, Guardian multimedia journalist and trans man
Michael McIntyre, comedian
Sally Magnusson, broadcaster on BBC Scotland
Gillian McKeith, television presenter and writer
Hilton McRae, actor
William Cameron Menzies, film director and production designer, winner of Academy Award for Best Production Design and Academy Honorary Award
Judith Miller, antiques expert, writer and broadcaster
Steve Morrison, TV producer and former Rector of the University
Marina O'Loughlin, restaurant critic
Katie Leung, actress, as Cho Chang in Harry Potter
Peter Pomerantsev, Soviet-born British journalist
Sir Eduardo Paolozzi, sculptor and pioneer in pop art
Catherine Rayner, illustrator and author
David Rintoul, actor
Varalaxmi Sarathkumar, actress
Alastair Sim, actor
Iain Stirling, comedian
Rachael Stirling, actress
Ed Stoppard, actor
Margaret Tait, filmmaker and poet^[52]
Bill Turnbull, journalist and television presenter
Greg Wise, actor, as John Willoughby in Sense and Sensibility
Sir David Wilkie, painter
Kirsty Wark, broadcaster

Music

Sir Henry Bishop, composer
Sir Adrian Boult, conductor
Tom Chaplin, lead singer of Keane
Erik Chisholm, composer
Anna Clyne, composer
Darius Danesh, musician and singer
Django Django, art rock band
James Douglas, composer
Tanya Ekanayaka, composer-pianist
Hans Gal, composer
Katie Gregson-MacLeod, musician
Marjory Kennedy-Fraser, singer and composer^[53]
Kenneth Leighton, composer
Sir Alexander Mackenzie, composer
Sir James MacMillan, classical composer
Stuart MacRae, composer
Eduardo Reck Miranda, composer and Professor of Computer Music
Marcus Mumford, lead singer of Mumford & Sons
Thea Musgrave, composer
Mylo, DJ
Sir Herbert Oakeley, composer
Carl Orff, German composer
Nigel Osborne, composer
The Rezillos, punk/new wave band
Max Richter, composer and pianist
Sir Donald Runnicles, conductor
Rebecca Saunders, composer
Mike Scott, founder of The Waterboys
Dan Tepfer, Jazz pianist and composer
John Thomson, composer
Sir Donald Francis Tovey, composer, pianist, musicologist
Julian Wagstaff, composer
David Wilde, pianist and composer
Derek Williams, composer, arranger and conductor
William Wordsworth, composer

History, philosophy, sociology and theology

Talal Asad, anthropologist
Marcella Althaus-Reid, theologian
John Anderson, philosopher
Sarah Broadie, philosopher
Jay Bernstein, philosopher
Tom Burns, sociologist
Alexander Bird, philosopher
John Baillie, theologian
S. Barry Barnes, philosopher and sociologist of science
David Bloor, philosopher, sociologist of science, and key figure in the Edinburgh school
John Burnet, classicist
Helen Bond, theologian
Irene Brown, linguist and codebreaker who worked at Bletchley Park
Thomas Brown, medicine and philosophy
Clifford Edmund Bosworth, historian and Orientalist specialising in Arabic and Iranian studies
Robert Bartlett, medievalist, winner of the Wolfson History Prize in 1993
James Burnett, Lord Monboddo, naturalist, philosopher, linguist
Benjamin Constant, French député and political thinker
V. Gordon Childe, eminent archeologist
Andy Clark, philosopher of mind and cognition
Pit Corder, linguist
Oswald Chambers, Baptist evangelist
Peter Comensoli, current Archbishop of Melbourne
Tom Devine, historian specialized in Scottish history
Christopher Dawson, Catholic historian
Ligon Duncan, theologian
Saul David, military historian
John Erickson, military historian
George Finlay, historian
Kit Fine, philosopher
David Fergusson, theologian
Adam Ferguson, philosopher and historian, contributed to the initial development of sociology
Ernest Gellner, philosopher, critical rationalist
H. A. R. Gibb, orientalist
Sir Patrick Geddes, sociologist, developed the concept of Conurbation
James Giles (born 1958), philosopher and psychologist
Michael Grant, classicist
John Gilchrist, linguist
Thomas Blom Hansen, anthropologist
Sir William Hamilton, 9th Baronet, philosopher and logician
John Holloway, sociologist and Marxist philosopher
Larry Hurtado, New Testament scholar
Alexander Henderson, second founder of Reformed Church in Scotland
John Hick, religious philosopher
David Hume, philosopher and historian
Michael Halliday, linguist, founder of Systemic functional linguistics
Michael Ingham, Anglican bishop and author
Edward Irving, founder of the Catholic Apostolic Church
Alison Jaggar, feminist philosopher
Martin Joos, linguist
Norman Kemp Smith, philosopher
Margot Käßmann, theologian, former leader of Evangelical Church in Germany
Rae Langton, philosopher
Peter Ladefoged, linguist and phonetician
Sir John Lyons, linguist
Michael Lynch, expert on Scottish Reformation
Elton Mayo, psychologist and organizational theorist
Ruth Barcan Marcus, philosopher and logician
Peter Millican, philosopher
Robert Murray M'Cheyne, church minister
Arthur Marwick, historian
Robert Morrison MacIver, sociologist
Donald MacKenzie, sociologist
Akbar Muhammad, historian specialized in African History
Neil MacGregor, art historian, former director of the National Gallery, London (1987-2002) and of the British Museum (2002-2015), founding director of the Humboldt Forum (2015-)
Sir Neil MacCormick, former MEP and legal philosopher
James Mill, historian, classical economist and utilitarian philosopher
Donald Nicol, Byzantinist
David Nicolle, military historian
Pippa Norris, political scientist
Christine Nuttall, linguisitics and teaching English as a foreign language
Cardinal Keith O'Brien, former Archbishop of Saint Andrews and Edinburgh
Richard Ovenden, Bodley's Librarian in the University of Oxford
Huw Price, philosopher
Duncan Pritchard, philosopher
Stuart Piggott, archeologist
Thorsten J. Pattberg, philologist and cultural critic
Geoffrey K. Pullum, linguist
Sir W. D. Ross, Aristotelian philosopher
David George Ritchie, philosopher
Rush Rhees, philosopher
Holmes Rolston III, philosopher, winner of the Templeton Prize in 2003
Sir Herbert Read, art historian, poet, literary critic and philosopher
David Talbot Rice, art historian who gave his name to the Talbot Rice Gallery at Edinburgh
William Robertson, Historiographer Royal and Principal of the University of Edinburgh
William Robertson Smith, orientalist and church minister
Steven Shapin, sociologist and philosopher of science, early founder on Sociology of scientific knowledge (STS)
Timothy Sprigge, philosopher
Dugald Stewart, enlightenment philosopher
Samuel Seabury, first American Episcopal bishop
John Toland, philosopher, coined the term "Pantheism"
Thomas F. Torrance, theologian, winner of the Templeton Prize in 1978
Iain Torrance, theologian and President of Princeton Theological Seminary
Géza Vermes, historian and theologian
Asher Wade, American-born international lecturer and psychotherapist
Robin Williams, developer of the concept of Social shaping of technology (SST)
Alexander Fraser Tytler, Lord Woodhouselee, historian and political theorist
Heather Widdows, philosopher
Timothy Williamson, philosopher
Jeremy Waldron, legal philosopher
William J. Watson, linguist and toponymist, scholar of the history of Scottish place names
W. Montgomery Watt, historian and Orientalist
Michael Worton, former Vice Provost of University College of London
Alex Woolf, medieval historian
Tullio Vinay, founder Agapè Center, Righteous Among the Nations
Immanuel Velikovsky, psychoanalyst
George Yule, linguist
Yang Changji, Chinese educator and philosopher, mentor and Godfather of Mao Zedong
Zhu Guangqian, philosopher on Aesthetics
John Zizioulas, Greek Orthodox Prelate

Others

Lulwah Al-Qatami, Nobel Peace Prize nominee and first woman from Kuwait to attend university overseas
B. T. S. Atkins, lexicographer
Chris Atton, university professor and musician
Susan Deacon, former Health Minister in the Scottish Executive, now Professor of Social Change at Queen Margaret University
Margaret Jarvie, counsellor
Edward Johnston, father of modern calligraphy, creator of Sans-serif
Alan M. Leslie, psychologist
David MacRitchie, archaeologist
Roger Mercer, archaeologist
A.S. Neill, educationalist, founder of Summerhill School
Madsen Pirie, founder and President of the Adam Smith Institute

Sports

Tommy Armour, threetime major golf championships winner
Leslie Balfour-Melville, outstanding all-round sportsman
Euan Burton, judoka
Bob Braithwaite, Olympic gold medalist in Trap shooting
Zbigniew Czajkowski, fencing master, "father of the Polish School" of fencing
Stephen Dick, hockey player
Eilidh Doyle, Olympic track and field bronze medalist
Gemma Gibbons, Olympic Judo silver medallist
Eilidh Gibson, canoeist
Katherine Grainger, Olympic rowing gold medallist
Stuart Grimes, international professional rugby union player
Alexander Watson Hutton, "The Father of Argentine football"
Peter Heatly, diver and former Chairman of the Commonwealth Games Federation
Sir Chris Hoy, the second-most successful British Olympian in history with six Olympic track cycling gold medals
Andy Irvine, rugby union player and president of the Scottish Rugby Union
Michael Jamieson, 200m breaststroke Olympic silver medallist
Eric Liddell, men's Olympic 400m gold medallist, and Scottish Rugby international
Caitlin McClatchey, swimmer and two-times Commonwealth Gold medallist
Margaret Maughan, Britain's first and four-times Paralympic games Gold medalist
Linsey MacDonald, Olympic bronze medalist in 400 metres
Judy Murray, mother and coach of professional tennis players Jamie Murray and Sir Andy Murray
Chris Paterson, Scottish international rugby union player
Alistair Potts, Commonwealth and British World Champion rower
Mark Robertson, Scottish international rugby union player
Jackie Robinson, 1948 Olympic Gold medalist in Basketball representing Team USA
Martin Sinclair, Silver medalist in the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games
Micky Steele-Bodger, English rugby international and Chairman IRB
Pat Spence, two-time Tennis Grand Slam mixed doubles champion
Robert Strang, English cricketer who played once for Scotland
Polly Swann, Olympic rowing silver medallist
Simon Taylor, international professional rugby union player
Catherine Taylor, Jon Duncan, Scott Fraser and Yvette Baker, orienteers with international success
Bungy Watson, English rugby union player^[54]

Miscellaneous

Ruth Adler, human rights campaigner^[55]
John Aikin, physician and writer
Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Jr, visual artist and member of the Bhutto family
Bakhtawar Bhutto Zardari, daughter of Benazir Bhutto, 11th and 13th Prime Minister of Pakistan, member of the Bhutto family
John (Ian) Bartholomew, cartographer and former principal of John Bartholomew and Son Ltd.
Thomas Spencer Baynes, publisher and writer
John Biggar, Scottish mountaineer who has made various first ascents in the Andes
James Blair, founder of the College of William & Mary
George Birkbeck, founder of Birkbeck College, University of London and co-founder of UCL
John Brown, physician and author
Archibald Cameron of Locheil, jacobite
Sam Denby, YouTuber
John Dalgleish Donaldson, mathematician, father of Mary, Crown Princess of Denmark
Robert Felkin, medical missionary; ceremonial magician, member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn; author on Africa; explorer and anthropologist
James Gall, clergyman and astronomer, founder of the Carrubbers Close Mission^[56]
Alastair Humphreys, Adventurer^[57]
Rev Bruce Kenrick, writer, minister, social activist and founder of Shelter
Rev Joseph Marsh, founder of Hill Street Academy
Ailsa Maxwell, Bletchley Park code breaker and historian
Sheila McKechnie, Scottish trade unionist and 1991 Alumnus of the Year
James Middleton, businessman and younger brother of Catherine, Princess of Wales
Philippa Matthews, socialite and younger sister of Catherine, Princess of Wales
Macvey Napier, encyclopedist
Mungo Park, explorer
Lyon Playfair, 1st Baron Playfair, scientist and parliamentarian
Daphne Pochin Mould, photographer, writer, geologist
Stella Rimington, former head of MI5
Peter Sawkins, winner of The Great British Bake Off 2020
Piers Sellers, astronaut
William Smellie, encyclopedist

University officials

Sir Edward Appleton, Nobel Laureate in Physics in 1947 for his discoveries of the Ionosphere, was Principal from 1949 to 1965.

Sir Edward Victor Appleton, former Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the university (1949–1965)
Edmund Allenby, 1st Viscount Allenby, former Rector of the university (1935-1936)
Arthur Balfour, former Chancellor of the university (1891–1930)
Stanley Baldwin, former Rector of the university (1923-1926)
Earl Beatty, former Rector of the university (1917-1920)
Gordon Brown, Rector of the university (1972-1975)
Viscount Cunningham of Hyndhope, Rector of the university (1945-1948)
Sir Winston Churchill, former Rector of the university (1929–1932)
Sir Alexander Fleming, former Rector of the university (1951–1953)
David Lloyd George, former Rector of the university (1920–1923)
William Gladstone, former Rector of the university (1859-1865)
The Earl of Rosebery, former Rector of the university (1880-1883)
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, former Chancellor of the university (1953–2010)
Anne, Princess Royal, Chancellor of the university (2011–present)

Notes

References

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[a]

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