参观科研所涉盗水稻种子 美起诉华两农业研究员

choi

RFA, Aug 4, 2018
https://www.rfa.org/cantonese/ne ... 08042018103321.html

, which is based on

Tom Polansek, Chinese Researchers Charged in Conspiracy to Steal US Rice Technology. Reuters, Aug 3, 2018
https://www.reuters.com/article/ ... ology-idUSKBN1KO2Q1
("The [rice] seeds were engineered by a company named Ventria Bioscience to contain certain proteins that can be removed from the rice and used in medicines and pharmaceutical products")

My comment:
(a) There is no need to read the rest of the very short Reuters report which sheds no light on anything else. The quotation is important, because US attorney's office press releases do not point this out, leaving readers at a loss about the motive.

(b) Press release: Chinese Nationals Charged with Conspiracy to Steal Rice Technology. US Attorney's Office for Eastern District of Arkansas, Aug 3, 2018
https://www.justice.gov/usao-eda ... eal-rice-technology
("A federal grand jury returned an indictment against Liu [Xuejun, 49,] and Sun [Yue, 36,] on Friday [Aug 3] for their involvement in the theft of rice seeds * * * The rice seeds were developed by a company called Ventria Bioscience, which used technology to create rice seeds that contained certain proteins. These proteins could then be removed from the rice and used in medicines and pharmaceutical products. Ventria, which is headquartered in Colorado and has a rice production facility in Kansas, has invested approximately $75 million in developing the intellectual property behind these rice seeds/ * * * Liu and Sun visited the United States in 2013. At that time, they both worked at the Crops Research Institute 天津市农作物(水稻)研究所 in Tianjin, China. Liu was a professor, and Sun was a research associate. Their trip was organized by Weiqiang Zhang, who was a rice breeder at Ventria in Kansas, and Wengui Yan, who worked at the Dale Bumpers Rice Research Center in Stuttgart[, Arkansas -- '45 miles (72 km) southeast of Little Rock': en.wikipedia.org]. When Liu and Sun ended their trip, they flew to Honolulu, Hawaii, on their way back to China. At the Honolulu airport, US Customs and Border Protection found stolen rice seeds in Liu and Sun's luggage, including seeds from the Dale Bumpers National Rice Research Center as well as seeds from the Ventria rice production facility in Kansas. * * * The two rice researchers who helped organize Liu and Sun's trip to the United States were convicted of their involvement in the scheme in a connected case in the District of Kansas (see link to press release below). Zhang, 47, was convicted at trial and sentenced to 10 years' imprisonment. Yan, 63, who worked in Stuttgart, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to one year in prison")
(i) The last sentence is meant to justify venue.
(ii) Presumably, their luggage contained large volume of rice seeds that look odd in X-ray scanning.
(iii) Both mass noun, luggage and baggage means exactly the same: suitcases, trunks, or bags (in plural form). See. eg, luggage
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/luggage
(iv) Presumably the duo were taken into custody in Honolulu airport, charged and detained pending indictment.

I am clueless about why it takes so long.
* Federal Rule Criminal Procedure 7(a)(1) states, "Felony. An offense (other than criminal contempt) must be prosecuted by an indictment if it is punishable:
(A) by death; or
(B) by imprisonment for more than one year."
* Speedy Trial Act, codified as 18 USC §3161, whose sub-section (b) states, "Any information or indictment charging an individual with the commission of an offense shall be filed within thirty days from the date on which such individual was arrested or served with a summons in connection with such charges."
* The 18 USC §3262(a) states, "In General.-Except as otherwise expressly provided by law, no person shall be prosecuted, tried, or punished for any offense, not capital, unless the indictment is found or the information is instituted within five years next after such offense shall have been committed."  The statute of limitations explains timing of  the indictment: arrests were made on Aug 7, 2013 in Honolulu airport.
(v)
(A) Dale Bumpers Rice National Rice Research Center, Agricultural Research Service (ARS), US Department of Agriculture.
https://www.ars.usda.gov/southea ... ce-research-center/
(B) Dale Bumpers
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dale_Bumpers
(vi) The link showed that both Zhang and Yan were charged (before indictment) by US attorney's office for District of Kansas on Dec 12, 2013. That Kansas press release said the date of airport search was "Aug 7, 2013," and that "Zhang and Yan * * * arranged for the Chinese delegation to visit the United States in 2013. Previously, the two [Zhang and Yan] had traveled to China at the same time in 2012 to visit a Crops Research Institute. * * * Stolen seeds were delivered [did not say by whom] to members of the Chinese delegation during the delegation's visit to the United States July 16 through August 7, 2013. * * * Seeds similar to what were found in the delegation’s possession as they left the United States in August 2013, were also found in Zhang's residence on December 11, 2013")
(vi) The disparity of sentences of Messrs Zhang and Yan strongly indicates that Zhang fought the charges and Yan cooperated (and even testified against Zhang). Economics research on prisoner's dilemma shows that cooperation sooner rather than later leads to the best outcome.

(c)
(i) Memorandum and Order. July 26, 2017. In US v Weiqiang ZHANG. US Dist Ct (D.Kan.) No 13-20134-01-CM.
https://scholar.google.com/schol ... amp;as_sdt=40000006
("In February of this year, a jury convicted defendant Weiqiang Zhang of three crimes: Count One, conspiracy to commit theft of trade secrets; Count Three, conspiracy to transport stolen property in interstate commerce; and Count Four, aiding and abetting the interstate transportation of stolen property. Following conviction, defendant filed a Motion for Judgment of Acquittal * * * For the following reasons, the court denies defendant's motion")
(A) In case number, 13 indicated the year the charge was brought, and CM is the initials of district judge Carlos Murguia.
(B) There is no need to read the rest, which is technical about law.

These two’s co-conspirators (there are two) have been p
(ii) Press release: Chinese Scientist Sentenced to Prison in Theft of Engineered Rice. Department of Justice, Apr 4, 2018
https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/c ... eft-engineered-rice
Weiqiang Zhang, 51, "was sentenced to 121 months in a federal prison * * * Zhang worked as a rice breeder for Ventria Bioscience in Junction City, Kansas. * * * Zhang has a master’s degree in agriculture from Shengyang [sic] Agricultural University in China and a doctorate from Louisiana State University.  According to trial evidence, Zhang acquired without authorization hundreds of rice seeds produced by Ventria and stored them at his residence in Manhattan. * * *  The rice seeds have a wide variety of health research applications and were developed to produce either human serum albumin, contained in blood, or lactoferrin, an iron-binding protein found, for example, in human milk [and 'saliva, tears, and nasal secretions': en.wikipedia.org] ")

Junction City, Kansas ("so named from its position at the confluence of the Smoky Hill and Republican rivers": en.wikipedia.org) is about 60 miles west of Topeka. Manhattan, Kansas, is about 15-mile air distance northeast of Junction City.

(d) But what did the four steal from Ventria Bioscience. It was called VEN100, and is now called (by the company) VEN120; both are recombinant lactoferrin, something nobody has heard of -- and turns out to be a junk. That happens frequently in science and medicine.
(i) Yes, VEN100 did receive fanfare back then. See
Amy Maxmen, Drug-Making Plant Blooms; Approval of a 'biologic' manufactured in plant cells may pave the way for similar products. Nature, 485: 160 (May 10, 2010' in the section of "News")
https://www.nature.com/news/drug ... 04?nc=1427321817746

Growing proteins (including medicines) in rice is not working -- probably because for a protein to properly fold it (protein) needs to be immersed in water. The first plant-made pharmaceutical (PMP) that FDA approved in 2012 was Elelyso (taliglucerase alfa) made by individual carrot cells suspended in bioreactors (vats you see in the Nature news; not in carrots) in Israel -- a very traditional manufacturing process, except that plant cells rather than animal cells or yeasts are used in bioreactors. See How is ELELYSO made?  Pfizer Inc, undated.
https://www.elelyso.com/how-is-elelyso-made

(Pfizer collaborates with the Israel-based Protalix Biotherapeutics that was featured in the Nature news.)

Presently ELELYSO is one of the three medicines (basically the same in terms of composition, by different pharmaceutcals), all to be injected intravenously every two weeks and costs more than half a million dollars each patient.
(A) Halfway down the online page is the TOP of a table whose bottom does not show up. One has to read the PDF version of this report (by clicking PDF" just beneath the byline) to view the table. In the table take notice of only VEN100 that Ventria studied or produced. Whatever it was and was for, Ventria has abandoned it.
(B) Gaucher's disease
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaucher%27s_disease
(section 7 History)
(ii) It is VEN120, of Ventria Bioscience, which the company HOPED (still hopes) would treat Inflammatory Bowel Disease. See VEN120: Inflammatory Bowel Disease. Ventria, undated.
http://www.ventria.com/medicines/ven120
(A) Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Mayo Clinic, undated.
https://www.mayoclinic.org/disea ... causes/syc-20353315

This information is written to educate the mass. However, it is good enough. Because its pathogenesis is unknown, there is no good treatment (in part due to lack of an animal model -- how to get mice, say, to develop IBD); what is available is to ameliorate inflammation. The cause of the disease is not treated, so inflammation does not go away.

National Institute of Health (NIH) does not have information about IBD.
(B) To me, it is simply foolish to think lactoferrin is capable of something -- despite the hype from Ventria:
MacManus CF, VEN-120, a Recombinant Human Lactoferrin, Promotes a Regulatory T Cell [Treg] Phenotype and Drives Resolution of Inflammation in Distinct Murine Models of Inflammatory Bowel Disease. J Crohns Colitis, 11: 1101-1112 (2017)
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28472424

The lesson: Look before you leap, or steal.