How a Cornell Chemical Engineer Became a Federal Judge, and the Lessons Learned Along the Way
John Murphy ’99, a United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, will trace his path from Olin Hall to the halls of justice. He will cover topics like: (i) how the law works (from the perspective of an engineer); (ii) careers in law; (iii) unexpected connections among the fields of law, science, and engineering; (iv) some of the challenges facing our legal system at the intersection of law and science; and, of course, (v) why an education in chemical engineering really does prepare you for anything. He will also share insights from his time in chemical engineering that have carried him over the years, such as the role of mentorship, the bedrock of ethical conduct, and how serendipity favors the prepared mind.
After Cornell, but before turning to a legal career, Judge Murphy followed the path of his mentors at Cornell, obtaining a Ph.D. in chemical engineering at Caltech, where he was an NSF fellow. There, he worked in the laboratory of Professor Mark E. Davis on a thesis entitled “Methods for Collection and Processing of Gene Expression Data.” He was also chair of Caltech’s Graduate Review Board, and obtained a patent on his work, two experiences that got him thinking about the law. From there, he attended Harvard Law School, where he was editor-in-chief of the Harvard Journal of Law and Technology, and then served as a clerk for Chief Judge Kimberly A. Moore of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. Before being appointed to the court, Judge Murphy was a partner at the law firm of Baker & Hostetler in Philadelphia, where he litigated patent, copyright, trademark, and trade secret disputes. Now, outside of the courtroom, Judge Murphy serves on the Committee on Codes of Conduct of the Judicial Conference of the United States and the Subcommittee on Artificial Intelligence. He also teaches at Villanova Law School and Rutgers Law School and is co-author of the last three editions of the popular law-school casebook Patent Litigation & Strategy.