Xi offered to help build a world-class oxide thin film lab at a Chinese university in one email; the exchanges, says Zeidenberg, had nothing to do with either the Pocket Heater or MgB2 thin films.
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This “new information” came in the form of several sworn affidavits from leading scientists confirming that schematics Xi sent to Chinese scientists had nothing to do with the proprietary device.
“At the right time, I will tell my side of the story”, he said.
“But the fact that they don’t consult with experts and then charge me?” Put my family through all of this? “They also ordered my wife and daughters to raise their hands and walk to a place (within the house)”. This is not a joke. Prof Xi had signed an agreement promising to keep its design a secret.
The technology involved a so-called “pocket heater”, used in semiconductor research.
And contrary to the indictment’s claim that such a device “revolutionized the field of superconducting magnesium diboride thin film growth”, it’s only a modified version of a 1993 invention by German scientists.
Superconductivity is the ability to conduct electricity without resistance.
A judge has yet to rule on the motion. Here is a video of Xi talking about his research.
The “spy vs. spy” saga between the US and China has been going on for some years now, with both countries trading accusations of conspiracy and clandestine attempts to steal sensitive information-from the arrest of an ex-NASA contractor to the conviction of two men for stealing Oreo’s precious recipe.
Xiaoxing Xi, a professor at Temple University in Philadelphia, was charged in May with wire fraud for allegedly scheming to defraud a US company by sharing its superconductor technology with China.
When asked about his future plans, Xi said he has not yet had time to consider it but he hopes to travel to see his mother as soon as possible, after missing her 90th birthday in June. And the technologies discussed, he says, “were not restricted in any way”. Although his work with Chinese entities had nothing to do with such a device, USA federal prosecutors thought “they are all the same”, Xi said. “Fortunately, the government had an open mind and was willing to listen to us”, Mr. Zeidenberg said.
“If he was Canadian-American or French-American, or he was from the United Kingdom, would this have ever even got on the government’s radar?”
Michael Turner, director of the Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics in Chicago and a former APS president, confessed to being stunned at the failure of investigators to seek out the appropriate scientific expertise before indicting Xi.
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A spokesman for Mr John Carlin, the Assistant Attorney-General overseeing the crackdown on economic espionage, had no comment on whether Justice Department officials in Washington reviewed the case.
