Akira Toriyama (Japanese: 鳥山 明, Hepburn: Toriyama Akira, April 5, 1955 – March 1, 2024) was a Japanese manga artist and character designer. He first achieved mainstream recognition for creating his highly successful manga series Dr. Slump, before going on to create Dragon Ball (his most famous work) and acting as a character designer for several popular video games such as the Dragon Quest series, Chrono Trigger, and Blue Dragon. Toriyama is regarded as one of the authors who changed the history of manga, as his works are highly influential and popular, particularly Dragon Ball, which many manga artists cite as a source of inspiration.

He earned the 1981 Shogakukan Manga Award for best shōnen manga with Dr. Slump, and it went on to sell over 35 million copies in Japan. It was adapted into a successful anime series, with a second anime created in 1997, 13 years after the manga ended. His next series, Dragon Ball, would become one of the most popular and successful manga in the world. Having sold 260 million copies worldwide, it is one of the best-selling manga series of all time and is considered to be one of the main reasons for the period when manga circulation was at its highest in the mid-1980s and mid-1990s. Overseas, Dragon Ball's anime adaptations have been more successful than the manga and are credited with boosting anime's popularity in the Western world. In 2019, Toriyama was decorated a Chevalier of the French Ordre des Arts et des Lettres for his contributions to the arts.

日本是个漫画大国，有资料显示日本的动漫产业年营业额超过90亿美元。已经成为了日本的第三大产业。每年日本都会有无数的漫画作品连载发行并红极一时。尽管如此，但能称得上影响深远甚至影响一个时代的作品毕竟还是屈指可数的。而鸟山明和他的《龙珠》绝对是其中之一。他和他的作品在日本漫画史上创下的纪录仍然高高在上，遥不可及。他不仅是日本漫画黄金时代的核心人物，更是立下了一座漫画史上的里程碑。作为日本漫画界首席代表，公认的日本漫画界主席，鸟山明和他的成名之作《阿拉蕾》和代表作《龙珠》在全世界都极受欢迎，广受赞誉，整整影响了几代人。 作品《龙珠》依旧在全世界大热，从而导致不断推出新的续作。

鸟山明的《龙珠》在日本大热后，他因居住地送稿不方便而准备迁离原居地，当地政府为了挽留他，特地在鸟山明家到机场之间修了一条高速公路，就是为了留住这位世界著名的漫画大师。安古兰国际漫画节（英语：Angoulême International Comics Festival）是欧洲规模最大、历史最为悠久的漫画展览盛会。鸟山明大师荣获了安古兰国际漫画节40周年特别奖。在全世界范围，《龙珠》收获了更多的支持者，欧美国家对于《龙珠》的喜爱同样不亚于日本，至于国内，则更不用说。毫不夸张地断言，《龙珠》改变的不光是漫画业界，而这个名字的价值更远远超出漫画本身，足可以成为一项单独的文化，在30年前和30年后，当孩子成为大人，它依然被世上那些和我们活过同样时光的一代人所铭记。