James W. Murray is a chemical oceanographer with a background in aquatic chemistry. His research is primarily in chemical oceanography, always with an interdisciplinary focus. He worked on the mechanisms that control the distribution of trace metals, nutrients, gases, and radioactive isotopes throughout the ocean with specific emphasis on research problems in the equatorial Pacific and Black Sea. He has recently turned his attention to the emerging problem of ocean acidification. At UW’s Friday Harbor labs, he built one of the first experimental facilities devoted to ocean acidification, and conducted experiments there to study the impacts on food-web interactions and structure. His most recent talks have been on peak oil and climate change. In recognition of his work, Murray was elected as a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Geophysical Union. He was a Fulbright Scholar at Bogazici University in Istanbul, Turkey in 2002 and will be a Residency Fellow at the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center in June 2016. He was the founding Director of UW Program on Climate Change and is presently Past-President of the Ocean Science Section of the American Geophysical Union.