Ian William Murison Smith FRS FRSC (15 June 1937 – 8 November 2016)[2][3] was a chemist who served as a research fellow and lecturer in the Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge from 1963 to 1985 and Professor of Chemistry at the University of Birmingham from 1985 to 2002.

[3][4] Smith was educated at Giggleswick School[3] then in the West Riding of Yorkshire and the University of Cambridge where he studied the Natural Sciences Tripos as an undergraduate student of Christ's College, Cambridge.

[2] Smith was a leading researcher in reaction kinetics, energy transfer and molecular dynamics in gas phase systems.

and awarded the Tilden Prize in 1983[2] and the Polanyi Medal in 1990 by the Royal Society of Chemistry.

His former doctoral students include David Klenerman[5][1] and Gus Hancock.