List of fictional scientists and engineers

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In addition to the archetypical mad scientist, western culture depicts scientists and engineers who go above and beyond the regular demands of their professions to use their skills and knowledge for the betterment of others, often at great personal risk. In this list of fictional scientists and engineers, an annotated alphabetical overview is given of some of the best-known beings in this category.

Contents

[edit] Individual scientist/engineers

[edit] Scientists and engineers in animation and video games

[edit] Scientists and engineers in comics

The universes created by DC Comics and Marvel Comics abound with scientists who became superheroes. They include:

  • Barry Allen, aka The Flash (The Flash) – Police scientist and superhero.
  • Dr. Bruce Banner, aka The Incredible Hulk (Hulk) – Scientist who developed the "Gamma Bomb" for the US Government. An accident at the site of a test led to his becoming the Hulk. For a long period after, while in the form of Bruce Banner, he would look for scientific ways to rid himself of the transformation.
  • Dilbert - Star engineer of the comic strip series, "Dilbert" in the Dilbert universe.
  • Donatello (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) – The most intelligent of the four Turtles, he builds a lot of advanced devices, often in the heat of battle.
  • Querl Dox, aka Brainiac 5 (Legion of Super-Heroes) – He is reputed to have a brain exponentially more powerful than a normal human.
  • Forge (X-Men) – Mutant engineering genius.
  • Jay Garrick, aka The Flash (The Flash) – Research scientist, superhero and founding member of the Justice Society of America.
  • Agatha Heterodyne, (Airship Entertainment, Girl Genius) - The heiress to the political background and scientific understanding of the Heterodyne Family.
  • Ted Knight, aka Starman (Starman) – Astronomer, expert scientist and superhero.
  • Will Magnus (Metal Men) – Creator of a team of advanced artificially intelligent robots.
  • Dr. Henry (Hank) Philip McCoy, aka Beast (X-Men) – World-renowned biochemist and mutant superhero.
  • Professor Ochanomizu, surrogate father of Osamu Tezuka's Astro Boy
  • Dr. Jon Osterman aka Dr. Manhattan (Watchmen) nuclear physicist transformed by accident into a godlike super-being. While publicized as a superhero, he functions as the ultimate weapon for the United States military.
  • Peter Parker aka Spider-Man (Spider-Man) – Superhero with great knowledge of advanced sciences, who now teaches at the High School he went to.
  • Ratchet (Transformers series) – Very skilled Autobot medic. In the G1 Comics, he sacrifices himself to kill Megatron.
  • Reed Richards, aka Mister Fantastic (Fantastic Four) – Scientist and inventor, regarded as one of the most intelligent people on Earth, leader of the Fantastic Four.
  • Ted Sallis, duplicator of the serum that created Captain America, transformed into The Man-Thing. Although he had serious problems with his personal ethics when it came to women and girls, he abandoned Operation Sulfer on moral grounds, and elected to remain as Man-Thing rather than allow innocents to be killed by the demon Thog.
  • Alan Scott (Green Lantern) - Engineer and the first Green Lantern
  • Doctor Sivana, full name Thaddeus Bodog Sivana - The World's Wickedest Scientist. Arch-enemy of Captain Marvel (DC Comics)
  • Angela Spica, aka Engineer II (The Authority)
  • Tony Stark, aka Iron Man (Iron Man) – An industrialist and electrical engineer of incredible ingenuity and inventive genius, whose technology to fight crime keeps him alive as well. He suffers from alcoholism.
  • Othar Tryggvassen (Girl Genius) - A powerful "spark", or mad scientist, bent on destroying all sparks, including himself.
  • Wally - Lazy and disillusioned engineer of the comic strip series in the Dilbert universe.
  • Bruce Wayne, aka Batman (Detective Comics, Batman) - The World's Greatest Detective (reputedly) with incredible scientific knowledge and forensic and memory skills that are second to none.
  • Professor Charles Francis Xavier, aka Professor X (X-Men) – The founder, mentor, and sometime leader of the X-Men.

[edit] Scientists and engineers in Star Trek

The Star Trek universe abounds with scientists and engineers. Thanks to the fact that the Starfleet Academy's curriculum includes a large portion of scientific and engineering training, pretty much all Starfleet officers on the various ST series can be considered to fit in the current category, even when they do not hold advanced degrees in the specific fields of science and engineering (with the exception of medical personnel, most of the advanced degree holding scientists seen so far have been civilians). More specifically, Starfleet has several specialised scientific branches. The Starfleet Engineering Corps produces creative engineers, and the doctors of Starfleet Medical are responsible for discovering the cures of several diseases and developing a number of groundbreaking medical procedures. Starfleet Science Officers are responsible for all kinds of scientific research not covered by the two other branches. Thus, a list of scientists and engineers in Star Trek might be as long as the list of Star Trek characters.

However, by narrowing the search to the set of main characters from each of the five series whose primary duty was science officer, chief medical officer or chief engineer, and adding the handful of scientists who've invented the technologies crucial to the stories, we can come up with a more manageable list:

[edit] Teams of scientist/engineers

[edit] See also