John E. McMurry (born July 27, 1942, in New York City) is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Cornell University.
The author of more than 100 research papers, McMurry is best known scientifically for his development of the McMurry reaction, in which two molecules of ketone or aldehyde are coupled to give an alkene when treated with titanium(III) chloride and a reducing agent such as Zn(Cu).
[citation needed] McMurry was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1985 and received a Max Planck Society Research Award in 1991.
[2] In addition to his scientific work, McMurry is the author of 45 undergraduate chemistry textbooks that have been translated into 12 languages and used throughout the world.
In 2022, he sold the rights for the book to OpenStax making it free for the user.