Ohio State University will pay the federal government $2.1 million for failing to report Chinese funding for a climate scientist who was working under Beijing’s Thousand Talents foreign expert recruitment program, the Justice Department announced Monday.
C.K. Shum, now a former Ohio State University professor, worked on NASA and National Science Foundation grants at the same time he was paid by Chinese state-run research institutes and universities, the department said in a statement.
The federal grants spanned the period from November 2012 to August 2023. Federal law since 2011 prohibits universities from using grant funds for collaboration with China or Chinese universities or companies.
“American universities that benefit from the federal government’s support for scientific research and advancement must fully disclose all foreign funding in their grant applications,” said Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate with the Justice Department’s Civil Division.
“We will continue to hold accountable any university that fails to comply with disclosure requirements designed to protect research security and federally funded scientific achievements.”
Chris Booker, an OSU spokesman, said the university uncovered Mr. Shum’s inappropriate foreign affiliations and reported them to NASA and the National Science Foundation.
Mr. Shum’s principal investigator privileges were then suspended and spending was halted for relevant federal awards while disciplinary proceedings were initiative, he said, noting the university repaid the funds in question.
“Shum is no longer employed at Ohio State, and the university has cooperated with federal authorities throughout the investigation,” Mr. Booker said noting “Ohio State takes national security seriously.”
Mr. Shum was fired in January and Yu Zhang is no longer employed by the university, he said.
Mr. Shum and workers at a laboratory he led, including one employee identified in court papers as Yu Zhang, were paid by Chinese entities while working on the U.S. contracts and the university failed to disclose the links as required by the contracts.
Chinese funding was reported by the employees to the university but OSU failed to report the linkages to the government, the settlement states.
“Shum participated in a Thousand Talents Program established by the [People’s Republic of China] to recruit individuals with knowledge of, or access to, foreign technology intellectual property,” the settlement states.
OSU discovered the overseas funding in September 2019 and Mr. Shum admitted to taking part in the talent program, setting in motion an investigation and disciplinary proceedings against the scientist, the settlement said.
NASA and NSF contacts require the disclosure of all foreign government funding for recipients.
Robert Steinau, an official in the NASA Office of Inspector General, said in the Justice Department statement: “The settlement and accompanying compliance agreement send a clear message: We will not tolerate institutions that conceal foreign ties and compromise national security. Our cutting-edge research must not fall into the hands of our adversaries.”
The university in 2024 repaid $254,661 to the federal government as a portion of the contract funding, the settlement said.
OSU denied the allegation but agreed to the $2.1 million settlement payment to avoid “protracted litigation” of the government’s claims.
No details of the NASA and NSF contracts in the case were disclosed.
Mr. Shum was listed on an Ohio State web page as working for the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Geodetic Science Laboratory for Space Geodesy and Remote Sensing Research in Columbus, Ohio.
Research fields included space geodesy, a science related to large Earth areas, sea level change, remote sensing, GPS occultation, temporal gravity field and ice sheet mass balance.
One online biography stated that Mr. Shum specialized in “studying phenomena affecting global climate changes.”
China launched its Thousand Talents program in 2008 to recruit scientists and researchers overseas, mainly from among ethnic Chinese working at American universities and national laboratories.
The Chinese offered funding, lab space and salaries in exchange for the target researchers providing expertise and, in some cases, sharing proprietary research with Chinese institutions.
Since 2018, prosecutors have charged several U.S. researchers with economic espionage or academic non-disclosure linked to the Chinese talent effort.
One high-profile case involved Charles Lieber, chairman of Harvard University’s chemistry department. He was caught lying to federal investigators about his role in the talent program and his links to China’s Wuhan University of Technology.
Lieber was convicted of false statements and tax charges in 2021. After completing his sentence of time served and leaving Harvard, he joined the faculty at Shenzhen International Graduate School in April 2025.
Other scientists linked to the China talent program included Emory neuroscientist Xiao-Jiang Li, who was convicted for failing to report foreign income, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology scientist Gang Chen, who had charges dismissed after prosecutors said they could no longer meet their burden of proof.
The settlement follows a Pentagon announcement Aug. 17 that it has issued formal notification to 30 U.S. academic institutions to review academic, financial and research collaborations with “foreign entities of concern.”
The review seeks to protect taxpayer-funded research from unauthorized technology transfer, intellectual property theft and enemy exploitation, according to the announcement.
“The Department of War has zero tolerance for academic partnerships that compromise our national security,” said Emil Michael, undersecretary of defense for research and engineering.
The remaining institutions eligible for future federal funding must conduct a comprehensive audit of foreign collaborations and terminate “problematic partnerships.”
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